Dr. Jon Elhai discusses ways psychiatrists and psychologists can responsibly implement tele-communication methods in their practice, including encrypted emails, text messages, and video chat. The conversation covers how doctors can maintain HIPAA-compliance as they pursue an online practice.

After reading these articles, you should be able to…

Narcolepsy affects about 1 out of 2000 people, for a prevalence rate of 0.05%. This puts it officially in the category of rare diseases. So why are we asking you to read about such a rare disorder? Partly because there’s a lot of comorbidity between narcolepsy and most psychiatric disorders. And partly because Jazz Pharmaceuticals is placing lots of ads in psychiatric journals urging us to diagnose more narcolepsy so that we’ll use their new drug Xyrem.

What basic questions should we be asking our patients who complain of sleep problems? We talk to Robert S. Rosenberg, DO, FCCP, to get his insight on sleep disorders, sleep apnea, restless leg syndrome, sleep studies, and benzodiazepines.

Geriatric depression often presents with apathy, low energy and motivation, and cognitive decline, so theoretically stimulants are a natural choice. Past studies of combining stimulants with antidepressants have been mainly small open trials, with mostly positive results. But we haven’t seen the kind of rigorous double-blind methodology we’d like. A new study fills that gap.

On July 10, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Otsuka and Lundbeck’s Rexulti (brexpiprazole) for schizophrenia and as an add-on to antidepressants for adults with depression. As the name suggests, it’s chemically and structurally related to aripiprazole (Abilify).

After reading these articles, you should be able to…

When we last reviewed neurostimulation devices 3 years ago, we concluded that there was some promise—but more sizzle than beef. Now there are more devices and more data. But is there more beef? Maybe.

Carly Simon swears by it. The daytime show “The Doctors” gave it a glowing review. Ads for it seem to be invading psychiatrists’ Google search results. We’re talking, of course, about the Fisher Wallace Stimulator and the similarly touted Alpha-Stim device. How do these devices work? Are they actually effective? And where do they fit into the rapidly expanding array of neuromodulators?