A PLOS Medicine analysis led by Fred Hutch Cancer Center researchers quantified the enduring impact that China’s health policies during the COVID-19 pandemic had on overall healthcare utilization. As the first country to report COVID-19 cases and implement infection control measures, and among the last to lift such policies, China’s experience presented a unique opportunity to study the relationship between public health measures and healthcare access.

A new study led by a Boston University School of Public Health researcher examined the perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes that influenced college students’ with a diagnosis of psychosis to seek help for their mental health and found that while a majority of these students believed they needed mental health treatment, 60 percent of students did not meet current recommended guidelines for combined antipsychotic medication and therapy. Published in the journal Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, the study found that nearly 8 in 10 surveyed college students with psychosis reported needing mental health support. While 8 in 10 students did seek therapy or counseling within the past 12 months, only 4 in 10 students reported taking antipsychotic medication. 

More than one in 10 children with medical complexity had an incident reported by home care agency staff, according to a multi-state study recently published in JAMA Network Open. Half of reported events were safety related and a quarter caused harm to the child.

Even minimal exposure to modern medicine can rapidly change the human microbiome. In a new study publishing May 20 in the Cell Press journal Cell Reports, researchers reveal that the gut microbes of remote Amazonian Indigenous communities began shifting toward patterns more commonly seen in urban, industrialized populations after only a few medical visits.  

A common vegetable oil may hold the key to fighting some of the world’s most dangerous viruses.  FIU received a U.S. patent for a linseed oil polyol-derived compound shown to inhibit viral infections including HIV and SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19), as well as bacterial infections causing strep and staph.

About The Study: This proof-of-concept randomized clinical trial provides insights into the therapeutic potential of interleukin 6 (IL-6) or IL-6 receptor inhibition for depression and highlights suitable patient selection methods. Interleukin 6, a keystone inflammatory cytokine, is a credible mechanistic candidate for causing depression.