Why MDMA-assisted psychotherapy may become an FDA-approved treatment for PTSD within 2 years

For peo­ple with post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der, recall­ing mem­o­ries of phys­i­cal or sex­u­al assault, com­bat or dis­­as­ter-relat­ed events can induce intense anx­i­ety or pan­ic attacks as well as debil­i­tat­ing flash­backs. In the U.S., about 7% of peo­ple suf­fer from PTSD and lose an aver­age of about four work­ing days each month as a result. Trau­­ma-spe­­cif­ic psychotherapy,…

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Study finds MDMA-assisted therapy to be safe and highly effective to treat severe PTSD

The First Phase 3 Suc­cess for Psy­che­delics Will Pave the Way for an Indus­try (Bar­ron’s): Post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der is a crip­pling, hard-to-treat psy­chi­atric afflic­tion. Amer­i­ca spends bil­lions of dol­lars year­ly just on the vet­er­ans who suf­fer from PTSD. So it’s heart­en­ing to see the report of a promis­ing new treat­ment, pub­lished Mon­day in Nature Medicine.

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Repetitive negative thinking may increase (or perhaps be caused by) cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s pathology

Demen­tia: neg­a­tive think­ing linked with more rapid cog­ni­tive decline, study indi­cates Demen­tia affects an esti­mat­ed 54 mil­lion peo­ple world­wide. There no cure, but reports indi­cate that approx­i­mate­ly a third of demen­tia cas­es may be pre­ventable, which is why many researchers have begun to focus on iden­ti­fy­ing risk fac­tors. This would allow for bet­ter per­son­alised interventions…

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UW Medicine creates new Institute for Brain Health Solutions focused on cognitive aging, brain wellness and mental health

__________ $50 mil­lion gift is foun­da­tion for brain dis­or­ders research (UW press release): “UW Med­i­cine is cre­at­ing the Gar­vey Insti­tute for Brain Health Solu­tions to devel­op effec­tive new treat­ments for brain dis­or­ders, such as depres­sion, post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der, addic­tion and Alzheimer’s dis­ease. The foun­da­tion­al $50 mil­lion gift to estab­lish the insti­tute was made by local…

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Trend: Biopharma embraces digital cognitive assessments to identify behavioral health biomarkers

_______ The hunt for behav­ioral health bio­mark­ers is har­ness­ing dig­i­tal health at the research stage (Med­C­i­ty News): “Dig­i­tal health com­pa­nies are going through an inter­est­ing trans­for­ma­tion as research insti­tu­tions real­ize the ben­e­fit of their tech­nol­o­gy to col­lect and man­age data for a host of stud­ies. The bio­phar­ma industry’s embrace of some dig­i­tal health tools to manage…

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Study: Common medication treatments for PTSD can increase the risk of developing dementia

—– Drugs for PTSD linked to increased risk of demen­tia (The Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal Jour­nal): “Cer­tain psy­chotrop­ic drugs used to treat post-trau­­mat­ic stress dis­or­der (PTSD) increase the risk of devel­op­ing demen­tia, includ­ing in patients who do not have PTSD but take the drugs for oth­er con­di­tions, study results pub­lished in the Jour­nal of the Amer­i­can Geri­atrics Society

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