You won’t get very far into any journal before you start reading about statistical significance, and its close sibling, 95% confidence intervals. But what do these terms mean, and how do they help us draw conclusions about studies?

Dr. Oransky, as Deputy Editor of The Scientist, I know that you spend a great deal of time looking at medical statistics, and you do an excellent job of making these concepts understandable in your column in CNS News, Statistically Speaking.

Vitamin E, recommended variously for preventing cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and tardive dyskinesia, has taken quite a drubbing in recent years. Recent results from Harvard’s Women's Health Study have put another nail in its coffin.

Guanfacine is an alpha-2 agonists approved for the treatment of hypertension, but commonly prescribed for posttraumatic stress disorder. Like clonidine, another alpha-2 agonist, guanfacine is believed to decrease norepinephrine release from noradrenergic neurons during states of heightened arousal.

We have no effective treatment for severe amphetamine dependence. Now, a study from Finland points to an obvious candidate treatment for those meeting DSMIV criteria for intravenous amphetamine dependence. Patients were randomly assigned to Abilify (aripiprazole--15 mg/day), Concerta (methylphenidate controlled release--54 mg/day) or placebo for 20 weeks.

Recently, the FDA approved the Amplichip CYP450 Test (from Roche Diagnostics), which is a device allowing laboratories to quickly find out whether your patient metabolizes drugs too slowly or too quickly.

After reading these articles, you should be able to…

Here are TCPR’s guidelines for how to deal with SSRI non-response.

The following imaginary case vignette helps us examine the clinical relevance of the major findings of the STAR-D trial.

The latest results from the CATIE trial indicate that treatment with Trilafon (perphenazine) is not only much cheaper than treatment with SGAs (second generation antipsychotics), but leads to superior overall quality of life for patients.