Ok first of all, sorry, but I have to say this, is Dr. Yatham the Indian cousin of (ugh) Donald Trump? Wow excellent combover, Lakshmi!

Alright, got that out of my system, lets get on to business, in this study they say that patients with bipolar 1 who stayed on mood stabilizers (lithium or Valproate) and antipsychotics (risperidone or olanzapine) for over a year did no better than patients who only stayed on the medications for 24 weeks. These are typical antipsychotics. They have severe side effects like bad weight gain and tardive dyskenisia, normally these antipsychotics are prescribed for schizoaffective disorder and schizophrenia as well.

“beyond six months of use, those taking risperidone experienced manic or depressive episodes as frequently as the placebo group. Those taking olanzapine, on the other hand, had the fewest episodes when using the medication over a whole year rather than stopping use after 24 weeks, making the year-long treatment most effective for that drug. Risperidone tended to delay mania, while olanzapine tended to delay depression.”

My personal experience: taking 900 mg/day of Lithium Carbonate ER, and 100 mg of Quetiapine Fumarate has kept me stable for over a year now. That is, mood-wise. Of course the childhood abandonment and abuse issues are no picnic, none at all, they are unpleasant, painful, not any fun! But if I hadn’t been stable mood-wise, I would not have been able to tackle these. And time it is, to tackle these.

So gratitude and love and laughter for all.

https://bbrfoundation.org/brain-matters-discoveries/antipsychotic-treatment-for-bipolar-disorder-not-always-effective-after

Lakshmi N. Yatham, M.D.

Some antipsychotic medicines commonly used to treat a type of bipolar disorder may not have clear benefits after six months of use, researchers have found.

There are different types of bipolar disorder. Bipolar I — what most people associate with the illness — is characterized by periods of mania (intense elevated mood, increased energy and speed of thinking, reduced sleep etc) and severedepression (low mood, no interest or motivation, lack of pleasure, suicidal thoughts etc) . This new study is the first to compare the effectiveness of certain antipsychotics in treating this type of bipolar disorder longer-term, following a period of mania.

Publishing their findings online October 13 in Molecular Psychiatry, the research team was led by Lakshmi N. Yatham, M.D., of the University of British Columbia, a 1996 NARSAD Young Investigator (YI) grantee who went on to receive Independent Investigator (II) grants in 1999 and 2003.

The study focused on people with Bipolar I being treated with a combination of an antipsychotic (risperidone or olanzapine) and a mood stabilizer (lithium or valproate). The patients enrolled in the study had recently experienced manic episodes. To compare how the antipsychotics worked over long periods, some patients continued on whichever antipsychotic they were already taking, for another six months or one year in conjunction with lithium or valproate. Others, serving as controls, took placebos (or dummy pills) instead of antipsychotics along with lithium or valproate. Then, the three groups were compared: How long did it take before each patient experienced another depressive or manic episode?

Overall, the researchers found, patients were less likely to have a mood episode if they continued on antipsychotics for 24 weeks rather than taking placebos . However, the benefits of continuing antipsychotics beyond 24 weeks were not apparent as the proportion of patients that had a mood episode was not different between 24 and 52 groups.

The team noted that extended use of both antipsychotics was accompanied by weight gain in patients — clinically significant weight gain on olanzapine in 35% of patients after a year of use, and some weight gain in 15%-17% of patients on risperidone with any length of use. This suggests that the relief provided by these drugs should be considered against the potential for significant weight gain.

The researchers also observed some differences between the two types of antipsychotics as regards their longer-term usefulness, and the types of mood episodes each antipsychotic medicine helped to prevent , although they caution that these findings must be considered preliminary . For instance, beyond six months of use, those taking risperidone experienced manic or depressive episodes as frequently as the placebo group. Those taking olanzapine, on the other hand, had the fewest episodes when using the medication over a whole year rather than stopping use after 24 weeks, making the year-long treatment most effective for that drug. Risperidone tended to delay mania, while olanzapine tended to delay depression. To unpack the effects of different treatments, the researchers say, future work should examine other types of antipsychotics as well as non-antipsychotic treatments like psychotherapy, and do so in a larger patient group.

Such truth and pain in these words, and such strength. Unless you’ve been through this, you’ll never know. But then I’ll never know what you’ve walked through either. Life demands strength, we cannot be weak and wallow and expect to thrive. After everything, after the fall, after the storm, after it all, the one standing is the strong one.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/blogs/well/2015/07/22/how-nature-changes-the-brain/?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=FB_paid&referer=http://m.facebook.com

JULY 22, 2015
A walk in the park may soothe the mind and, in the process, change the workings of our brains in ways that improve our mental health, according to an interesting new study of the physical effects on the brain of visiting nature.

Most of us today live in cities and spend far less time outside in green, natural spaces than people did several generations ago.
City dwellers also have a higher risk for anxiety, depression and other mental illnesses than people living outside urban centers, studies show.
These developments seem to be linked to some extent, according to a growing body of research. Various studies have found that urban dwellers with little access to green spaces have a higher incidence of psychological problems than people living near parks and that city dwellers who visit natural environments have lower levels of stress hormones immediately afterward than people who have not recently been outside.
But just how a visit to a park or other green space might alter mood has been unclear. Does experiencing nature actually change our brains in some way that affects our emotional health?
That possibility intrigued Gregory Bratman, a graduate student at the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources at Stanford University, who has been studying the psychological effects of urban living. In an earlier study published last month, he and his colleagues found that volunteers who walked briefly through a lush, green portion of the Stanford campus were more attentive and happier afterward than volunteers who strolled for the same amount of time near heavy traffic.
But that study did not examine the neurological mechanisms that might underlie the effects of being outside in nature.
So for the new study, which was published last week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Mr. Bratman and his collaborators decided to closely scrutinize what effect a walk might have on a person’s tendency to brood.
Brooding, which is known among cognitive scientists as morbid rumination, is a mental state familiar to most of us, in which we can’t seem to stop chewing over the ways in which things are wrong with ourselves and our lives. This broken-record fretting is not healthy or helpful. It can be a precursor to depression and is disproportionately common among city dwellers compared with people living outside urban areas, studies show.
Perhaps most interesting for the purposes of Mr. Bratman and his colleagues, however, such rumination also is strongly associated with increased activity in a portion of the brain known as the subgenual prefrontal cortex.
If the researchers could track activity in that part of the brain before and after people visited nature, Mr. Bratman realized, they would have a better idea about whether and to what extent nature changes people’s minds.
Mr. Bratman and his colleagues first gathered 38 healthy, adult city dwellers and asked them to complete a questionnaire to determine their normal level of morbid rumination.
The researchers also checked for brain activity in each volunteer’s subgenual prefrontal cortex, using scans that track blood flow through the brain. Greater blood flow to parts of the brain usually signals more activity in those areas.
Then the scientists randomly assigned half of the volunteers to walk for 90 minutes through a leafy, quiet, parklike portion of the Stanford campus or next to a loud, hectic, multi-lane highway in Palo Alto. The volunteers were not allowed to have companions or listen to music. They were allowed to walk at their own pace.
Immediately after completing their walks, the volunteers returned to the lab and repeated both the questionnaire and the brain scan.
As might have been expected, walking along the highway had not soothed people’s minds. Blood flow to their subgenual prefrontal cortex was still high and their broodiness scores were unchanged.
But the volunteers who had strolled along the quiet, tree-lined paths showed slight but meaningful improvements in their mental health, according to their scores on the questionnaire. They were not dwelling on the negative aspects of their lives as much as they had been before the walk.
They also had less blood flow to the subgenual prefrontal cortex. That portion of their brains were quieter.
These results “strongly suggest that getting out into natural environments” could be an easy and almost immediate way to improve moods for city dwellers, Mr. Bratman said.
But of course many questions remain, he said, including how much time in nature is sufficient or ideal for our mental health, as well as what aspects of the natural world are most soothing. Is it the greenery, quiet, sunniness, loamy smells, all of those, or something else that lifts our moods? Do we need to be walking or otherwise physically active outside to gain the fullest psychological benefits? Should we be alone or could companionship amplify mood enhancements?
“There’s a tremendous amount of study that still needs to be done,” Mr. Bratman said.
But in the meantime, he pointed out, there is little downside to strolling through the nearest park, and some chance that you might beneficially muffle, at least for awhile, your subgenual prefrontal cortex.

Wow, this is very powerful and scary yet such important information for anyone experiencing suicidal thoughts on antidepressants. It’s by Shareen Mansfield.

Reblogged on WordPress.com

Source: “I spent five days looking up ways to kill myself.”