Lockdown Magnified Postpartum Depression; Long-Term Insomnia Meds Flop

During the first COVID-19 lockdown in London, nearly half of new moms with babies 6 months old or younger met criteria for postnatal depression — more than doubling the rate of that prior to the pandemic. (ScienceDaily)

A pilot program found that Mightier video games paired with applied behavior analysis was tied to a 45% improvement in autism-related symptoms in kids versus behavioral analysis alone, the company announced.

Starting treatment with internet-delivered cognitive behavioral therapy followed by in-person therapy as needed was noninferior to in-person therapy alone in a randomized study involving children and adolescents with obsessive-compulsive disorder. (JAMA)

Two randomized clinical trials conducted in Brazil and Peru found that the early benefit of a 6-week behavioral activation digital intervention for improving depressive symptoms in people with comorbid hypertension or diabetes was not maintained long-term. (JAMA)

A study on prescription medications for insomnia in middle-age women found there were no significant improvements in disturbed sleep compared with non-users after either 1 or 2 years. (BMJ Open)

People diagnosed with borderline personality disorder were more likely to engage in self-harm, attempt suicide, and have chronic feelings of emptiness. (JAMA Network Open)

Full phase III trial results for a study of MDMA-assisted therapy for remission of severe post-traumatic stress disorder, first presented at this year’s virtual American Psychiatric Association meeting, were published this week in Nature Medicine.

Canada-based Psyched Wellness contracted with the National Research Council of Canada to study the potential neuroprotective roles of AME-1 extract from the psychedelic Amanita muscaria mushroom. (Yahoo! Finance)

University of California San Francisco unveiled its new 150,000-square-foot psychiatry building, which aims to integrate outpatient mental healthcare, psychiatric training, and clinical research; it’s scheduled to open this fall.