Each month our editorial team sifts through hundreds of papers and curates notable findings—for practitioners and informed readers who want to stay current with the evidence. Subscribe to the monthly Research Digest for expert analysis and concise summaries of key papers.
Treatment-resistant depression means depression that does not get better after usual treatments. Scientists do not all agree on one clear definition, which makes it hard to know exactly how common it is or which treatments work best. Using the definition that regulators often use, about 30% of people with depression…
This paper is a careful review of research about treatment-resistant depression. The authors looked through medical studies to see how doctors define this kind of depression, what makes it hard to assess, and which treatments have been tried. They describe drug strategies like adding lithium or thyroid hormone, switching antidepressant…
Researchers ran a clinical trial that directly compared ketamine treatment with electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) in people whose major depression had not improved with other treatments and who did not have psychosis. The trial found that ketamine was “noninferior” to ECT, which means ketamine worked at least as well as ECT…
Researchers reviewed many studies on ketamine for depression and found that we still do not have firm answers about the best dose, how fast to give it, which way to give it, how long to treat, or how often to give treatments. Most studies used 0.5 mg/kg given over about…
Depression is a prevalent psychiatric disorder that often leads to poor quality of life and impaired functioning. Treatment during the acute phase of a major depressive episode aims to help the patient reach a remission state and eventually return to their baseline level of functioning. Pharmacotherapy, especially selective serotonin reuptake…
This 2017 clinical review explains how bipolar I and II disorders are diagnosed and treated. It says bipolar illness involves swings between manic (or hypomanic) and depressive episodes. Treatment usually needs both medicines and psychosocial therapy, and care must be adjusted over time because relapses and incomplete responses — especially…
In an open-label pilot study, 32 adults (ages 22–72; 53% female) with ongoing suicidal thoughts took low-dose oral ketamine for six weeks (starting at 0.5 mg/kg and titrated up to 3.0 mg/kg). Average scores on the Beck Scale for Suicide Ideation fell from a high level before treatment to below…
Current literature shows that benzodiazepines and probably lamotrigine reduce ketamine's treatment outcome, which should be taken into account when considering ketamine treatment. There is evidence for an interaction between ketamine and clozapine, haloperidol, and risperidone. Due to small sample sizes, different subject groups and various outcome parameters, the evidence is…
The neurodiversity movement grew out of autistic self-advocacy groups in the mid-1990s that met online. It is a social justice movement that asks for civil rights, equality, respect and inclusion for neurodivergent people. Early email lists and forums such as ANI-L (1994) and InLv (founded 1996) helped shape the idea…
This systematic review looked for events that can trigger sudden mood episodes in people with bipolar disorder. The authors examined 108 studies published up to May 23, 2022. They found the strongest evidence that antidepressant use is linked to manic or hypomanic episodes. Other reported triggers for mania included brain…
This study used nationwide Danish health records to compare 979 people with bipolar depression who had just been discharged from a psychiatric ward. Of these, 358 received antidepressants and 621 did not. The researchers followed everyone for 1 year and, after adjusting for baseline factors, found no statistically significant increase…
This Japanese study looked at 2,231 outpatients with bipolar disorder and found that 29.1% had a manic or hypomanic episode within one year. Lower functioning (lower GAF score), rapid cycling, a coexisting personality disorder, bipolar I diagnosis, substance abuse, and being in a manic or mixed mood at the start…
