Anxiety and Substance Abuse

Matt Kushner, PhD discusses the issue of substance abuse in individuals with anxiety disorders. Because substance abuse is more common in those with anxiety in comparison to the rest of the population, Kushner has created a list of risk factors and screening tools to help doctors identify individuals experiencing both disorders. Some risk factors for substance abuse in people who …

Drunkorexia

There is a new kind of eating disorder that has been recently plaguing many college students. This disorder is referred to as Drunkorexia. Drunkorexia is a mix of starving yourself and binge drinking. People engage in Drunkorexia in order to make up for the calories from alcohol by not eating regular food. The demographic that most commonly falls victim to Drunkorexia are college females.  These …

Abused and Misused: Opiods

The most overprescribed drugs that have have captured public interest are opioids. What a lot of people don’t know is that a 29% increase in pharmaceutical overdose deaths was caused by misuse of benzodiazepines, which have sedative properties. Dr. Steven King, MD, believes benzodiazepines are overprescribed, especially for patients with chronic pain. Benzodiazepines are often overlooked by the public, who …

Effects of Vitamin D on Mental Illness

Current Psychiatry posted an article suggesting that vitamin D levels are related to different mental illnesses. Although more than 50% of psychiatric patients are reported to have vitamin D deficiencies, there is still not enough evidence to say that vitamin D supplementation will help with symptoms. One way vitamin D enters our systems is through exposure to sunlight. UV radiation …

On the Borderline

I am writing a presentation for the UCSF Bipolar Program on the topic of the relationship between Borderline Personality Disorder and Bipolar Disorder and I thought I would jot down some of my thoughts in a quick post. Borderline personality disorder involves a “pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image, and affects, and marked impulsivity” which begins by early adulthood …

Compulsions, Addictions and Secrecy

I got an urgent call yesterday from somebody that I’ve been seeing for several years.  His fiancee had just left him.  They had been having problems for several months, problems mostly rooted in his ambivalence about commitment.  She went on his cell phone and found evidence that he had been having flirtatious conversations with seven different woman over the last …

Matt Tierney on Take What You Need

Running out the door at the end of a long day, I paused to talk with Matt Tierney, our resident substance use expert, about the conversations I had yesterday about 12 step programs, their value and the role they play in people’s lives. When I was new to psychiatry, I had a natural antipathy to 12 step. It seemed to embody the notion of rigid …

Marijuana: Reefer Madness

Psychosis Risks with Marijuana Use This article is taken from Bipolar Network News. “At a recent conference Robin Murray, a researcher based in London, gave a talk about the potential adverse effects of tetrahydrocanabinol (THC). Considerable data indicate that chronic long-term smoking of marijuana is associated with the doubling of the risk of psychosis. Moreover, if a marijuana user has a …

NAC (n-acetyl-cysteine)

We were impressed by a recent study of n-acetyl cysteine as a treatment for marijuana dependence. It was a well designed study from a very reputable research group and the results were significant: the number of clean urines in the group getting NAC was twice as high as in the placebo group. It got us more interested in the agent …

Smoking (Marijuana)

Lots of folks with depression and bipolar use marijuana to help feel more stable. We like to keep an open mind but we have to say we are not impressed with marijuana as a mood stabilizer. In fact, the closest thing that we can think of in terms of prescribed medications to marijuana (gabapentin or Neurontin) is a medication which …