We are all aware that media and technology have fundamentally changed our day-to-day lives, but there is a lot of confusion and misinformation about what an “always connected” lifestyle actually means. Dr. Robb describes the addictive effects of technology on children and adolescents in this interview.

Few disorders frustrate clinicians as much as anorexia nervosa (AN). In the June 2015 issue of TCPR, we interviewed James Lock, who guided us through one of the few effective AN treatments, family-based therapy (FBT). In FBT, a family therapist works with the entire family to come up with a weight restoration plan for the patient.

After reading these articles, you should be able to…

Chronically irritable children are not at increased risk to develop manic episodes as they age; instead, they are at increased risk for anxiety and unipolar depression later in life. Moreover, unlike children with bipolar disorder (BD), chronically irritable children do not tend to have unusually strong family histories of BD. Rather, there are both genetic and familial links between chronic irritability and unipolar depression.

Disruptive behavioral disorders are the most common preadolescent disorders in child psychiatry and behavioral pediatrics. Dr. Parry discusses the landscape, diagnosis, and treatment of disruptive mood dysregulation disorder (DMDD).

Many clinicians are still unclear about how bipolar disorder got to be such a common diagnosis, most specifically in the United States. Dr. Carlson describes a historical perspective on bipolar disorder as a diagnosis in children.

Atomoxetine was not originally included in that rogue’s gallery of medications, but since the drug was originally developed as an antidepressant, the FDA later reviewed its safety data. A post-hoc meta-analysis of placebo-controlled trials revealed an increased risk of suicidal thinking, and so atomoxetine was also slapped with a black box warning.

Stimulants are fairly effective but tend to cause more side effects in autistic ADHD kids than in children with pure ADHD. Atomoxetine was only equivocally effective in one trial, and the immediate-release version of guanfacine was tested in a small open-label trial, resulting in improvement in about half the subjects.

After reading these articles, you should be able to…