Electric Shock Ban? FDA Expands Caplyta Label; Bipolar Disorder Strategies

The FDA may decide soon whether to ban using electric shocks on people with disabilities, including children with autism or schizophrenia, to reduce self-injurious or aggressive behavior. (Mother Jones)

Meanwhile, the agency expanded the indication for lumateperone (Caplyta) to prevent relapse in schizophrenia, Johnson & Johnson said.

Researchers identified a cyclical and downward-trending pattern of suicide in a 122-year analysis of U.S. mortality data. (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences)

A cross-sectional study showed that use of medication for opioid use disorder increased among Medicaid beneficiaries in nearly every state from 2019 to 2023, suggesting improved access. (JAMA Network Open)

Other research in JAMA Network Open indicated that prescriptions for antipsychotics and other drugs that affect cognition in older adults were more likely to be initiated in emergency departments and hospitals, not doctors’ offices.

Compass Pathways, Transcend Therapeutics, and the Usona Institute are the companies that were granted FDA fast-track vouchers to expedite psychedelics for psychiatric conditions. (Endpoints News)

In two cohorts of patients with bipolar disorder, clozapine monotherapy, clozapine plus aripiprazole, and long-acting injectable antipsychotics plus lithium were tied to a lower relapse risk compared with lithium monotherapy. (Nature Mental Heath)

Could the emergence of at-home brain stimulation devices, like Flow Neuroscience’s FL-100 headset, reduce psychiatry’s reliance on antidepressants? (New York Times)

Chicago invested over $16 million into a new street psychiatry pilot program and expanded mental health services. (CBS News)

“There hasn’t been a president who is more sane,” said Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. during a House hearing on Friday, stating that an assessment of President Trump’s mental fitness was not necessary and that he would not recommend invoking the 25th Amendment. (The Hill)

Ukrainian psychiatrist Semyon Gluzman, MD, who openly opposed the Soviet Union’s widespread use of psychiatry as a tool of oppression, died at age 79. (New York Times)

Gambling ads on social media are over two times more likely to reach men than women, an Irish analysis found. (Journal of Behavioral Addictions)