Elephant Sedative Emerges as New Threat in Overdose Battle

Tiny accidental alterations in dose will kill.....

http://goo.gl/S3iAA3

A drug used to sedate elephants and other large animals, 100 times as potent as the fentanyl already escalating the country's heroin troubles, is suspected in spates of overdoses in several states, where authorities say they've found it mixed with or passed off as heroin.

The appearance of carfentanil, one of the most potent opioids known to investigators, adds another twist to the fight against painkillers in a country already awash in heroin and fentanyl cases.

Each time authorities start to get a handle on one type of drug, another seems to pop up, said Joseph Pinjuh, chief of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force and narcotics unit for the U.S. attorney in Cleveland.

"You feel like a kid with his finger in the dike, you know?" he said. "We're running out of fingers."

A man suspected of selling carfentanil as heroin was indicted this week in central Ohio on 20 counts, including murder, in connection with a July 10 death and nine other overdoses that happened within hours of one another. Some of the surviving users told investigators they thought they were buying heroin, but testing found none, Franklin County prosecutor Ron O'Brien said. The suspect, Rayshon Alexander, pleaded not guilty.

Investigators are trying to track down the source of the carfentanil. Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said he was unaware of any thefts of the drug, which, he noted, could be shipped from abroad or produced here.

Chinese companies sell carfentanil online, but it hasn't shown up much in the U.S. drug supply, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. There hasn't been much evidence of carfentanil on the streets or in testing related to criminal cases, said agent Rich Isaacson, a spokesman for the DEA's Detroit Division, which covers Ohio.

Locking doors in mental health hospitals does not lower suicide rate

http://goo.gl/6MDWPH

Researchers in Germany have compared outcomes for locked and unlocked accommodation in a 15-year study of around 145,000 patients. The authors believe that an open door policy may be preferable, as it can promote a better therapeutic atmosphere and more positive health outcomes.

Authorities around the world are increasingly using locked-door policies to keep patients safe from harm, but locked doors also restrict personal freedom.

Most of the patients had brain disorders relating to dementia, substance use, schizophrenia, and affective disorders, including mood disorders, such as depression, stress-related, and personality disorders.

They looked at the numbers of completed suicides, attempted suicides, leaving and then returning, and absconding without return.

They then factored in whether the hospital had an open door policy or not, and whether the wards were locked, partly locked, open, or if they were day clinic wards.

Findings revealed similar rates of suicide and attempted suicide, regardless of whether a hospital had a locked door policy or not. Furthermore, hospitals with an open door policy did not have higher rates of absconding, either with or without return. Patients who left an open door hospital without permission were more likely to return than those from a closed facility.


4 Black Women Writers Get Honest About Mental Illness And Race

http://goo.gl/gtuRuO

Zeba Blay: I’ve been thinking a lot about identity. About how our identities shape the way we navigate the world, and how the world navigates us. When I think about myself, I think, “I’m black (first), I’m a woman, I’m a writer, and I’m mentally ill.”

I get to write about all these intersections of my identity in ways that really help me process my illness. But lately, in the wake of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile and everything going on, writing has been hard. I’ve slipped into bouts of debilitating depression, and it’s all triggered by racism.

I’m experiencing a kind of “racism beat” fatigue, where I feel I have nothing more to say about the constant deaths, the constant injustices. I feel conflicted, because as someone who writes about culture I know it’s my job to tackle these issues. But I’m finding that my blackness and my mental health is getting in the way. I’m taking it allin on an incredibly personal level, and beyond the general fatigue is this deep melancholy ― I know my depression is getting worse. Does this make sense?


The Surviving Spirit Newsletters

All the newsletters are available....

http://goo.gl/2Ur9Ra

The Surviving Spirit newsletter has been going out for many years. The idea behind the newsletter is to share news, resources and helpful information that could help any and all who have been impacted by the concerns of trauma, abuse or mental health.

A major point of the newsletter has always been to focus on those who have been affected by these health issues, and yet they are doing incredible things with their creativity or advocacy in helping others. These folks and organizations are what we like to think of as the Unsung Heroes of Life. And their respective endeavors and accomplishments should be shared with others — their example of overcoming adversity is a great way to offer hope, healing and help to others.

What started with a mailing list of several hundred has grown into a list of several thousand. We are fortunate that other organizations and individuals share the newsletter with their friends and colleagues. The newsletter reaches people all over the US, Canada, England, Scotland, Ireland, Switzerland, many parts of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Kenya, Ghana, Israel, Jamaica, South Africa, Cameroon, Puerto Rico, Iceland and Thailand.

Gastrointestinal disorders involve both brain-to-gut and gut-to-brain pathways

There is probably a similar logic operating in other conditions, both brain and gut......
http://goo.gl/QXoQRx

In the study, higher levels of anxiety and depression were significant predictors of developing IBS or indigestion within 1 year. People who did not have elevated levels of anxiety and depression at the start of the study but had documented IBS or indigestion reported significantly higher levels of anxiety and depression after 1 year.

The researchers calculated that in one-third of individuals, a mood disorder precedes gastrointestinal disorder, but in two-thirds a gastrointestinal disorder precedes the mood disorder.

"We believe these results are really a breakthrough in conceptualizing IBS. The data indicate some patients with IBS have a primary gut disease that may not only explain their gut symptoms but also their psychological distress," said Prof. Nicholas Talley, senior author of the Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics study.


 Nearly Half of All Women in Jail Are Disabled

https://goo.gl/E3pQGM

 In addition to facing disproportionate rates of incarceration, people with disabilities are also especially likely to be the victims of police violence. Freddie Gray, Eric Garner, Kristiana Coignard, and Robert Ethan Saylor—all individuals with disabilities whose tragic stories of being killed at the hands of police officers garnered significant recent national-media attention—are but four high-profile examples of a sadly commonplace occurrence. While data on police-involved killings are limited, one study estimates that people with disabilities make up between one-third and one-half of all individuals killed by law enforcement. And according to an investigation by The Washington Post, one-quarter of the individuals shot to death by police officers in 2015 were people with mental-health conditions.

What’s more, once people with disabilities are incarcerated, they are often illegally deprived of necessary medical care, supports, services, and accommodations. A recent report by the Amplifying Voices of Inmates with Disabilities Prison Project highlights numerous examples of inmates denied access to needed medications, prosthetic limbs, and hearing aids; individuals with cognitive impairments unable to access medical treatment because they were unable to fill out request forms; inmates who are deaf missing medication delivery because of lack of accommodations; inmates who have sustained injuries due to lack of accessible toilets and showers; and more.


UW-Madison launches new online resource on depression

http://goo.gl/wj8Y2A

For many individuals struggling with depression, the stigma and misunderstanding surrounding the disease can be isolating.

“My mom was sort of ashamed and she told me to keep it a secret,” one young adult said.

She’s one of 38 young adults whose experiences with depression have been cataloged and are now available in a new online resource,healthexperiencesusa.org, for the public and the medical community.

By sharing her story, she found relief.

“It’s a lifting of weight,” she said.

The website hopes to help others as well. Earlier this week, the Center for Patient Partnerships at the University of Wisconsin-Madison launched the site, the first of its kind in the United States. It aims to provide support for patients and perspective for medical professionals.


Does the immune system influence our social behavior?

The continuing integration of our understanding of brain, gut, and immune systems.....

http://goo.gl/0pGg3G

Although certain observations seemed to point to a link between the immune system and neurological functioning -psychological stress slows wound healing, for instance - it was not until the 1970s that the picture became clearer.Robert Ader demonstrated that an immune response could be conditioned in rats, proving once and for all that there were intimate ties between the two systems.

Since those early days, a new discipline, sometimes referred to as psychoneuroimmunology, has sprung up to study this fascinating field.

An investigation carried out last year by Jonathan Kipnis, Ph.D., chairman of UVA's Department of Neuroscience, uncovered further connections between the brain and immune system. Specifically, they found links between the vessels of the meninges (layers of tissue that coat the central nervous system) and the lymphatic system (an immune highway).

This discovery reversed the common belief that the brain was "immune privileged" and lacked direct communication between the two systems.

Kipnis's latest endeavor sheds even more light on brain-immune interaction. The team found that an immune molecule - interferon gamma - might play an important role in social behavior.

Interferon gamma is normally released in response to a pathogen attack, whether a virus, bacteria, or parasite. A number of animals, including zebrafish, flies, rats, and mice also activate interferon gamma when they are being social.

For the current study, the researchers blocked this molecule from taking effect in mice brains. This genetic modification caused hyperactivity in the brains of the animals. They became significantly less social. Once the molecule was reintroduced, brain connectivity returned to normal levels, and social behavior resumed.

The findings hint at a wider role for the immune system in social interaction.

"It's extremely critical for an organism to be social for the survival of the species. It's important for foraging, sexual reproduction, gathering, hunting. So the hypothesis is that when organisms come together, you have a higher propensity to spread infection. So you need to be social, but [in doing so] you have a higher chance of spreading pathogens.

The idea is that interferon gamma, in evolution, has been used as a more efficient way to both boost social behavior while boosting an anti-pathogen response."

Lead author Anthony J. Filiano, Ph.D., Hartwell postdoctoral fellow

According to the researchers, an immune system that is not working correctly could be involved in social problems related to neurological and psychiatric disorders. This research is but the first step along what promises to be a bountiful path of discovery. The implications for autism and other conditions could be huge, but it is too early to make predictions.

Medication implant may improve opioid abstinence among adults with opioid dependence

http://goo.gl/gvGvjV

In a study appearing in JAMA, Richard N. Rosenthal, M.D., of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, and colleagues examined if 6-month subdermal buprenorphine implants maintained low to no illicit opioid use relative to daily sublingual (beneath the tongue) buprenorphine among currently stable opioid-dependent patients receiving buprenorphine maintenance treatment.

Eighty-one of 84 (96 percent) receiving buprenorphine implants and 78 of 89 (88 percent) receiving sublingual buprenorphine were responders (≥ 4 of 6 months without opioid-positive urine test result [monthly and 4 times randomly] and self-report). Over 6 months, 72 of 84 (86 percent) receiving buprenorphine implants and 64 of 89 (72 percent) receiving sublingual buprenorphine maintained opioid abstinence. Non-implant-related and implant-related adverse events occurred in 48 percent and 23 percent of the buprenorphine implant group and in 53 percent and 13.5 percent of participants in the sublingual buprenorphine group, respectively.

"Buprenorphine is an effective treatment for opioid dependence; however, adherence to daily dosing for management of chronic disorders is challenging. An implantable buprenorphine delivery system reduces adherence issues and may improve efficacy," the authors write.


Infections, antibiotic use linked to manic episodes in people with serious mental illness

People have been saying this was true for decades, but it was mostly passed off as a symptom of illness...

http://goo.gl/oICVKq

In research using patient medical records, investigators from Johns Hopkins and Sheppard Pratt Health System report that people with serious mental disorders who were hospitalized for mania were more likely to be on antibiotics to treat active infections than a group of people without a mental disorder.

Although the researchers caution that their study does not suggest cause and effect, they note that it does suggest that an infection, use of antibiotics or other factors that change the body's natural collection of gut and other bacteria may individually or collectively contribute to behavioral changes in some people with mental disorders.

Their findings, published in Bipolar Disorders, add to evidence that the body's immune system, the so-called gut brain axis, and the particular bacterial microbiome each person has play an integral part in the ebb and flow of psychiatric symptoms and psychiatric disorders, including bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

"More research is needed, but ours suggests that if we can prevent infections and minimize antibiotic treatment in people with mental illness, then we might be able to prevent the occurrence of manic episodes," says Robert Yolken, M.D., the Theodore and Vada Stanley Distinguished Professor of Neurovirology in Pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. "This means we should focus on good-quality health care and infection prevention methods for this susceptible population and pay extra attention to such things as flu shots, safe sex practices and urinary tract infections in female patients."