Journal Digest

Methylphenidate May Be Associated With Low BMI in Some ADHD Patients

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While methylphenidate is known to be effective at improving symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children, some evidence suggests that the medication may have adverse effects on children’s height, weight, and blood pressure.

An analysis published in BMC Psychiatry suggests that in some boys with ADHD, methylphenidate use is associated with low body mass index (BMI).

Researchers from the University of Cork in Ireland and colleagues assessed health data from boys aged 6 to 15 who took part in the German KiGGS study. Of the 4,244 boys in the study, 65 took methylphenidate for ADHD for less than 12 months, 53 boys took methylphenidate for one year or more, 320 boys had ADHD but were not taking medication, and 3,806 boys did not have ADHD.

The researchers found that boys aged 6 to 10 who took methylphenidate for less than 12 months were about 4.5 times as likely to be underweight (BMI in the bottom third percentile) as those of similar age who were in the control group. Boys aged 11 to 15 who took methylphenidate for a year or more were 3.5 times as likely as controls to be underweight.

Boys taking methylphenidate were not found to be at significantly higher risk of having low height or increased blood pressure.

Physicians “should discuss with all patients and their parents the potential effects [of methylphenidate] on growth and balance theses effects with the outcomes of not treating ADHD symptoms,” the authors wrote.

Facebook Language May Offer Clues About Future Depression

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Language in Facebook posts may offer clues about users’ risk of depression, suggests a study in PNAS.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania analyzed data from patients who had visited the emergency department (ED) and agreed to share data from their electronic health records as well as Facebook. Of the 683 patients included in the study, 114 were diagnosed with depression.

The researchers scanned the relative frequency with which the participants used various words and two-word phrases. They identified a set of language markers that, when used frequently over the six-month period immediately preceding the ED visit, could identify depressed patients with about 72 percent accuracy. When assessing the language patterns of the participants three months earlier (looking at Facebook activity three to nine months prior to the ED visit), the language software had an accuracy of about 62 percent.

Other Facebook-posting measurements, such as average length of posts, frequency of posts, or time/day of posts, did not improve the researchers’ ability to predict depression, suggesting language content is the key predictor.

“The profile of depression-associated language markers is nuanced, covering emotional (sadness, depressed mood), interpersonal (hostility, loneliness), and cognitive (self-focus, rumination) processes, which previous research has established as congruent with the determinants and consequences of depression,” the authors wrote.

“The growth of social media and continuous improvement of machine-learning algorithms suggest that social media–based screening methods for depression may become increasingly feasible and more accurate,” they continued.

People With ADHD Found at Higher Risk for Borderline Personality Disorder

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The inability to regulate emotions is a symptom commonly reported in patients with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and borderline personality disorder (BPD). A study in Molecular Psychiatry now suggests that people with ADHD are at a higher risk of BPD than those without the disorder.

Researchers at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm analyzed Swedish medical registry data and found that individuals with an ADHD diagnosis were almost 20 times as likely to also have a BPD diagnosis than individuals not diagnosed with ADHD. The strength of the association between ADHD and BPD was similar regardless of sex.

Having a relative with ADHD also increased the risk of BPD. The more similar the genes between relatives with ADHD, the greater the likelihood of BPD.

“Clinicians should be aware of increased risks for BPD in individuals with ADHD and their relatives, and vice versa,” the authors wrote.

Smartphone Intervention May Reduce OCD Symptoms

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A smartphone-based intervention using principles of cognitive flexibility might help reduce obsessive-compulsive symptoms, such as repetitive hand-washing behaviors, suggests a study in Scientific Reports.

“One of the most common types of OCD … is characterized by severe contamination fears and excessive washing behaviors,” researchers at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom and colleagues wrote.

The study included 93 healthy adults who had obsessive-like contamination fears. The participants were assigned to watch one of three 30-second videos (31 participants per group) on their smartphones, four times a day, for one week. The first group watched a brief video of themselves engaging in handwashing, the second group watched themselves repeatedly touch a “disgust-inducing” object, and the third group (control group) watched themselves performing sequential hand movements.

The idea behind the videos was that vicarious viewing of obsessive behaviors might help desensitize the participants to the stimuli that trigger handwashing. Having each person watch their own hands instead of the same set of hands helped to control for the idiosyncrasies of repetitive behaviors.

The researchers assessed participants’ contamination fears, OCD symptoms, and mood before and after the intervention, as well as their performance on a task-switching game that measures cognitive flexibility.

Compared with participants in the control group, those in the active intervention groups (who watched videos of washing and touching) experienced a greater reduction in symptom scores and errors on the task-switching game after one week.

Animal Study Examines How Social Interactions Inform Drug Seeking

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An animal study published in Nature Neuroscience finds that social interactions can have a profound effect on limiting addictive behaviors. This study, conducted by investigators at the National Institute on Drug Abuse, reinforces the idea that social support is an important factor in how the brain responds to drug-associated cues.

The investigators developed rat models of both methamphetamine and heroin dependence and then placed them in environments where they could pull levers to receive the drug or interact with other rats. They observed that regardless of the dependent drug, length of the animal’s dependency, or how long the animal had been without the drug, the rats chose social interaction over drug self-administration. Even rats housed in a social setting preferred social contact when given the choice. However, the researchers could attenuate the preference of social interaction if they delayed the opportunity for social contact or coupled it to an aversive stimulus (for example, electric shock).

The researchers also noted that rats that repeatedly chose social contact over drug did not show signs of craving or withdrawal.

“These findings highlight the need for incorporating social factors into neuroscience-based addiction research and support the wider implantation of socially based addiction treatments,” the researchers wrote. ■