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Measuring What Matters in Peer Support: Using Competencies and Fidelity to Strengthen the Workforce
Introduction: The Next Phase of Peer Support Development Peer support, a cornerstone of recovery-oriented behavioral healthcare, is a rapidly expanding service model nationally. Delivered by individuals with lived experience of mental health challenges, substance use, trauma, or disability, peer...
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NIH Researchers Discover Pain-Relieving Drug with Minimal Addictive Properties
Positive safety profile of novel drug compound is surprise for class of synthetic opioids shelved years ago. Researchers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have identified a novel, highly potent opioid that shows potential as a therapy for both pain and opioid use disorder. In a study...
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Meeting the Moment: Addressing the Challenges to Advance Solutions for Mental Health Clinical Trial Recruitment
Mental health has become one of the most urgent and complex public health challenges of our era. Today, more than 1 billion people globally live with some form of a mental health disorder.1 Among young people, the situation is equally concerning: 1 in 7 adolescents experience a mental health...
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Teen Drug Use Remains Near Historic Lows, NIH-Supported Survey Finds
For the fifth year in a row, use of most substances among teenagers in the United States has continued to hover around the low-water mark reached in 2021. The findings come from the latest report of the Monitoring the Future Survey, an annual survey of drug use behaviors and attitudes among eighth,...
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NYSPA Report – Biomarkers for Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders: A Way to Reduce Stigma
The numbers are so depressing. The United States has the worst maternal mortality of any developed country, with a racial disparity that is shocking.[1] Mental health conditions are one of the leading causes of pregnancy-related death – in some places, THE leading cause.[2] We do a dismal job of...
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Rewriting Recovery: A Mind-Body Model for OCD and Depression
Background: Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) affects over 3 million adults in the U.S. and is frequently accompanied by depression, anxiety, gastrointestinal issues, and sleep disturbances. Standard treatments, particularly selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), often fall short—up...
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Implantable Device Reverses Opioid Overdose in Animals
An implantable device detected opioid overdose and automatically administered naloxone, saving lives in rat and pig models. The device hasn’t yet been tested in people. If successful, it might also be adapted to treat other emergencies, such as life-threatening allergic...
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Federal Study Examines Care Following Nonfatal Overdose Among Medicare Beneficiaries; Identifies Effective Interventions and Gaps in Care
Researchers from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that among...
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Basic Research Has Had a Major Impact on Developing New Treatments for Serious Mental Illnesses
Depression is the leading cause of disability worldwide, with an estimated $2 trillion annual economic impact. The cost in terms of human suffering is, of course, incalculable. Each year about 8% of adults—nearly 20 million Americans—experience major depression; 8% of adolescents experience at...
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Ketamine for Mental Health Treatment: How Promising Is It?
For centuries, we have sought cures for depression. Some discoveries, such as psychotherapy and medication treatment, are now widely accepted. But they don’t work for everyone. More recently, an unorthodox drug has garnered attention as a new, possible intervention: ketamine. Classified as...
