Originally From Psychiatric News Update -- In recent years, research throughout the scientific and medical community has suggested a link between trauma and epigenetic changes, chemical modifications that affect gene activ...

We are looking for people who have had a good course of illness with lithium included in their treatment regimen to help spread the word that lithium works extremely well and its side effects are erroneously overestimated....

Highlights from the International Society for Bipolar Disorders Conference Posters and Presentations, Chicago, June 22-25, 2023 -- Greg Murray gave a talk on effectiveness of multiple types of psychotherapy for bipolar dis...

Editor’s Note: Lithium is vastly underutilized. There is wide spread ignorance about its many assets and misconceptions about its few side effects. Here is an update that should be of interest to potential users, family me...

(This is an invited contribution by Robert Westhead.) -- This 50 year old man had a lifetime of incapacitating rapid cycling (10 days up and 10 days down) bipolar I disorder, but then for the past 4 years has had a complet...

In a 2021 review article in a special issue of the Journal of Neurochemistry devoted to “Psychedelics and Neurochemistry,” researcher Alaina M. Jaster and colleagues summarized recent findings on psychedelic drugs, includi...

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash -- In a 2020 article in the Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology, researcher Gonzalo Salazar de Pablo and colleagues described characteristics of youth with three different...

Photo by Andriyko Podilnyk on Unsplash -- Researchers from two 15-year studies of bipolar youth, COBY (The Coarse and Outcome of Bipolar Youth Study) and BIOS (Bipolar Offspring Family Study), have used the longitudinal da...

Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash -- At the 2020 meeting of the International Society for Bipolar Disorders, researcher Flavio Kapczinski described a recent meta-analysis of 10 studies that found that bipolar disorde...

The most common epigenetic marks involve methylation of DNA (which usually inhibits gene transcription) and the acetylation and methylation of histones. Acetylation opens or loosens the winding of DNA around the histones a...

A 2020 review article by researchers Julia Richetto and Urs Meyer in the journal Biological Psychiatry provides a good overview of the role epigenetic modifications play in schizophrenia and related disorders. -- The artic...

Our Editor-in-Chief, Dr. Robert M. Post, shares his personal recommendations for the treatment of children and adolescents with symptoms of bipolar disorder. Remember: Patients and family members must consult a physician a...

At the 2019 meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, one symposium was devoted to new research on predicting onset of bipolar disorder in children who have a family history of the disorder. Below...

At the 2019 meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, one symposium was devoted to new research on predicting onset of bipolar disorder in children who have a family history of the disorder. Below...

At the 2019 meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, one symposium was devoted to new research on predicting onset of bipolar disorder in children who have a family history of the disorder. Below...

A recent study suggests that chemicals called phthalates that are used to make plastic flexible and to improve the texture of lotions, creams, and powders have effects on human sperm. Phthalates have become common in our e...

A scientific statement from the American Heart Association reported in 2015 that youth with major depressive disorder and bipolar disorder are at moderate (Tier II level) increased risk for cardiovascular disorders. The co...

Dr. Post -- On May 4, 2017, at the annual conference of the International Society for Bipolar Disorders (ISBD) in Arlington, Virginia, Dr. Robert M. Post, Editor-in-Chief of Bipolar Network News, was presented the Mogens S...

Normal variations in genes can affect risk of mental illness. One gene that has been implicated in psychosis risk is known as BDNF. It controls production of brain-derived neurotrophic factor, a protein that protects neuro...

A recent study suggests that when a mother rat exercises during pregnancy, her offspring will exercise more too. -- In the study, published by Jesse D. Eclarinel and colleagues in The FASEB Journal, pregnant mother rats we...

Pediatric Acute-Onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome, or PANS, describes a condition in which a child develops acute onset of psychiatric symptoms following an infection. At the 2015 meeting of the American Academy of Child and...

Pediatric acute neuropsychiatric syndrome (PANS) is a little-known syndrome in which a child has an acute onset of psychiatric symptoms following a bacterial or viral infection, when the antibodies generated to fight the i...

A STUDY ASSESSING YOUR CHILD’S MOOD AND BEHAVIOR -- Parents, if your child (aged 2 – 12) has mood or behavioral difficulties, we would like to enlist your participation in a study called the Child Network. Parents who enro...

“Society’s accumulated myths and fears about disability and disease are as handicapping as the…limitations that flow from actual impairment.” -- —US Supreme Court -- Attorney Katharine Gordon has provided some information ...

Keith O’Neil is a former Super Bowl champion and the founder of the Forever Foundation, an organization whose mission is to educate the public about bipolar disorder and to de-stigmatize the illness. In September he spoke ...