Schizophrenia, a condition that is thought to affect 1% of the world’s population, remains one of the most challenging psychiatric disorders to treat.

Roche Pharmaceuticals’ potential new medication for schizophrenia, bitopertin (RG1678), failed its first two phase III trials. In both trials, adding bitopertin to antipsychotics for 24 weeks failed to improve persistent negative symptoms of schizophrenia as measured by PANSS (Positive and Negative Symptoms Scale) scores when compared to placebo, according to a report released by the company in January.

Johnson & Johnson will begin providing all clinical trial data gathered through its Janssen pharmaceuticals arm to Yale School of Medicine’s Open Data Access (YODA) Project. Physicians and researchers will be able to request access to the anonymized data through YODA, and not the drug company.

A January 2014 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that alcohol screening and brief counseling by physicians can significantly reduce weekly alcohol consumption and binge-drinking episodes, but that only one in six people has ever talked with their doctor or other health professional about alcohol use.

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Some people with serious mental illness suffer from cognitive problems, such as not being able to process information quickly, concentrate, or remember new information. While some psychiatric medications have cognitive effects, it’s now understood that the mental illnesses themselves can cause much of the cognitive dysfunction.Cognitive dysfunction is a primary...

This article will present ethical considerations of the ACA for psychiatrists. For the most part, ethical dilemmas for psychiatrists will occur in the quality and efficiency improvement category. Particular areas of concern are new innovations to improve quality and bring down costs, integrated health systems, linking payments to quality outcomes, payment bundling, and paying physicians based on value rather than volume.

Ethical expert Dr Paul Appelbaum tells us how the Physician Payment Sunshine Act will affect psychiatrist.

The largest and fastest-growing subset of Social Security Disability (SSDI) beneficiaries is patients with psychiatric diagnoses, even as the federal SSDI Trust Fund diminishes. In 2005, the Social Security Administration authorized the Mental Health Treatment Study (MHTS) to test the hypothesis that a comprehensive, team-based, supported employment program would increase the likelihood that beneficiaries would find work.

Most medical journals (as well as TCPR) require authors to disclose their affiliations with pharmaceutical companies or other for-profit entities, to help readers assess for any evidence of bias.