Loneliness and Social Media Use Among Adolescents with Psychiatric Disorders.

Studies have demonstrated that a prolonged feeling of loneliness is a major risk factor for psychopathology among children and adolescents. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the association between patterns of social media use with loneliness and psychopathology among 65 adolescents who were diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and treated at a psychiatric outpatient clinic in Israel. Social capital (online and offline) was negatively associated with loneliness. There was no association between loneliness and patterns of social media use, age, gender, psychiatric diagnosis, or disease severity. Our findings indicate that both online and offline social capital are associated with loneliness, and highlight the importance of studying the effect of peer online social support in alleviating loneliness.

Body mass index increase in preschoolers with heterogeneous psychiatric diagnoses treated with risperidone.

OBJECTIVE: Use of risperidone in preschool-aged children is growing, with rising concerns of adverse metabolic consequences. Longitudinal data on risperidone-related weight gain in preschoolers are scarce. We aimed to evaluate changes in body mass index (BMI) that are associated with risperidone treatment in preschoolers. METHOD: We analyzed naturalistic, longitudinal data on 141 preschool children (112 boys, 29 girls) receiving psychiatric care. Mean patient age at baseline was 5.0 years (SD=0.8) and average follow-up period was 1.3 years (SD=0.8), with >8 mean BMI measurements per patient. We studied the effect of risperidone exposure (n=78) on age-and-sex-standardized BMI (BMI Z-score) implementing mixed models with random subject intercepts to account for repeated measures, covarying for multiple confounders including demographics, stimulant treatment and psychiatric diagnoses. We employed similar models to study dose and duration effects. RESULTS: Risperidone treatment was significantly associated with an increase in BMI (effect size of exposure=0.45 SD (SE=0.06), t (949)=7.7, p<0.001) covarying for stimulant exposure and other confounders, independent of treatment indication. Females exhibited stronger effects (risperidone treatment × sex interaction t=2.32, p=0.02)). Risperidone daily dose was associated with increase in BMI (for each additional 1 mg, effect size=0.28 SD (SE=0.07), t(419)=3.76, p<0.001). CONCLUSION: Similar to older populations, risperidone treatment in preschoolers is associated with significant weight gain, with evidence for dose effects. Findings provide critical data that can inform clinicians.

Differences in demographic and clinical characteristics between cannabis users and non-drug users: A retrospective study of patients at first hospitalization due to psychotic symptoms.

This retrospective, chart review, cohort study compared demographic and clinical characteristics of cannabis -users and non-drug users at first admission due to psychotic symptoms at Geha Mental Health Center, Israel, between August 2002 and December 2013. We assessed the role of current cannabis use as a risk for re-hospitalization during this period as well as the stability of psychotic diagnoses at re-hospitalization. A total of 318 patients were included in the study, of which 106 (33.3%) were cannabis -users. The cannabis-user group had a shorter duration of hospitalization than the non-drug user group but without a significant difference in 5-year re-hospitalization rates. The latter had a higher rate of severe mental illness (SMI) diagnoses at first hospitalization (53.3% vs. 20.3%, respectively), but the difference disappeared at the second hospitalization. The two groups demonstrated a 79-80% rate of conversion from a non-SMI to an SMI diagnosis between the admissions. The results indicate the instability of non-SMI diagnoses at first hospitalization due to psychotic symptoms, regardless of concurrent cannabis use. The high conversion rate from non-SMI to SMI in current cannabis-users may be due to under-diagnosis of SMI at first admission or an effect of cannabis on the development of SMI.