Substance use by adolescents may prove valuable in identifying the presence of underlying disorders, a new study suggests.The NewsTeenagers who use cannabis, alcohol and nicotine are more likely to have underlying psychiatric symptoms, and worse symptoms, than their peers who are not regularly using substances, new research has found.The research, published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics, found that such substances are linked to an array of symptoms and conditions, including anxiety, depression, hyperactivity and suicidal ideation. These findings suggest that asking adolescents about substance use may provide a powerful screening tool when looking for underlying mental health issues, researchers said.“Universally screening for psychiatric symptoms in the context of all types of substance use is what we think might be most important,” said Brenden Tervo-Clemmens, assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Minnesota and lead author of the paper.“All the symptoms of mental health we examined, be it depression, suicidal thoughts, ADHD, were elevated no matter what the substance was,” he added.The study’s authors found that some adolescents may be using substances to self-medicate while also experiencing worsening symptoms through such use.Jenna Schoenefeld for The New York TimesThe Findings: Drug Use as Self-MedicationThe paper found that the link between substance use and mental health existed even at low levels of drug and alcohol use. Dr. Tervo-Clemmens said that adolescents with low levels of substance use may be self-medicating and that their relatively modest substance use was not likely to be causing the underlying mental health challenges.But the research also found that the most frequent and intensive users of the substances experienced the most severe mental health symptoms. In these instances, Dr. Tervo-Clemmens said, the adolescents may be worsening their symptoms even as they use substances to self-medicate.Specifically, the study found that daily or near-daily use — but not weekly or monthly use — of substances was linked to a moderate increase in symptoms. Researchers described the connection as “dose dependent,” because the level of use was linked to the intensity of symptoms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? 

Distracted driving is a worsening problem, safety experts say. Yet there is still no definitive database of the number of crashes or fatalities caused by it.Cellphones can track what we say and write, where we go, what we buy and what we search on the internet. But they still aren’t being used to track one of the biggest public health threats: crashes caused by drivers distracted by the phones.More than a decade after federal and state governments seized on the dangers that cellphone use while driving posed and began enacting laws to stop it, there remains no definitive database of the number of crashes or fatalities caused by cellphone distraction. Safety experts say that current estimates most likely understate a worsening problem.The absence of clear data comes as collisions are rising. Car crashes recorded by the police rose 16 percent from 2020 to 2021, to 16,700 a day from 14,400 a day, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or N.H.T.S.A. In 2021, nearly 43,000 Americans died in crashes, a 16-year high.In 2021, only 377 fatal wrecks — just under 1 percent — were reported as having involved a cellphone-distracted driver, according to the traffic agency. About 8 percent of the 2.5 million nonfatal crashes that year involved a cellphone, according to the highway agency’s data.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? 

The NewsPrescriptions for drugs used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder surged during the coronavirus pandemic, particularly among women and patients ages 20 to 39, according to new research compiled by scholars affiliated with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.The increase came as prescription rates held relatively steady for other key classes of behavioral health medications used to treat conditions such as depression and anxiety, according to the study, which was published on Wednesday in JAMA Psychiatry.The reasons are not totally clear, the researchers found, and could include pandemic-related stress, recognition of undiagnosed cases, over-prescription and online marketing of medications.Lisa Cosgrove, a clinical psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, who was not involved in the study, said the results “seem counterintuitive,” since the pandemic was a time when most people were not in school or offices, environments where attention-related issues often come to light.The study’s authors noted that social media might have played a role in the increase in A.D.H.D. prescriptions, as telemedicine services “used social media services to advertise treatments for behavioral health conditions, such as A.D.H.D. and eating disorders.”Dr. Cosgrove, who studies psychiatric treatment practices, agreed. She hypothesized that online influencers and other people who spoke openly on platforms like TikTok about their own A.D.H.D. diagnoses might have prompted viewers to explore and “self-diagnose.”“There are just so many TikTok videos about people being diagnosed with ADHD and embracing the A.D.H.D. identity,” Dr. Cosgrove said.Stephen Hinshaw, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, and an expert on A.D.H.D., said that the “TikTok phenomenon” and other social media platforms almost certainly led to some over-prescription of medications owing in part to “quick and dirty” self-diagnoses through online questionnaires, along with easier access to online prescriptions of stimulants.But one benefit, he said, is that social media may have enabled many people to recognize that they had untreated A.D.H.D. This may be particularly true of women, he added, as they come to understand that A.D.H.D. is not just a “boy’s disease,” as it has long been characterized.The NumbersThe study, conducted by scientists at the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, a division of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, compared prepandemic prescriptions of drugs in five classes with prescriptions during the pandemic, which the study defined as a two-year period from April 2020 to March 2022. Compared with the two years prior, the pandemic period saw declines in prescriptions of two classes of drugs: benzodiazepines, which are used to treat anxiety and other conditions, and buprenorphine, which is used to treat opiate-use disorder. Benzodiazepine prescriptions fell by 9 percent and buprenorphine prescriptions declined by 2 percent.Prescriptions of antidepressants rose 10 percent over that period. But the authors of the study note that the increases were consistent with similar patterns before the pandemic, so “the changes in levels and trends were not significant for antidepressants.”By contrast, the prescription rates for A.D.H.D. drugs “significantly increased during the Covid-19 pandemic, exceeding prepandemic rates, notably in young adults and women,” the study found.Among people ages 20 to 39, prescriptions of A.D.H.D. Schedule II stimulants, which include Ritalin and Adderall, rose 30 percent. Schedule II drugs have a “have a high potential for abuse which may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence,” according to the federal government. Prescriptions of non-stimulant A.D.H.D. medications rose 81 percent among 20- to 39-year-olds and 59 percent among women overall, the study found.The study also revealed a shift in the drugs’ prescribers. During the pandemic, prescriptions of A.D.H.D. stimulants by nurse practitioners rose by 57 percent compared with prescriptions by that group two years prior, while prescriptions by psychiatrists fell by 1 percent.A similar pattern emerged with non-stimulant A.D.H.D. medications. Prescriptions by nurse practitioners rose 74 percent during pandemic, compared with an increase of 12 percent by psychiatrists.Behind The NumbersThe results raised several questions, the researchers wrote: Notably, to what extent were A.D.H.D. drugs appropriately prescribed?The sharp increase in prescriptions during the pandemic highlighted the continued need “to define treatment appropriateness,” as well as to explore “how marketing and prescribing practices evolved,” the authors concluded.Some evidence suggests that A.D.H.D. was being overdiagnosed even before the pandemic. Dr. Cosgrove also noted that the information about behavioral and mental health shared on TikTok and other platforms was often misleading, and she said there was a need for more rigorous diagnosis.

Jennifer Livovich started a nonprofit to give socks to the homeless population in Boulder, Colo. She lost it, and more, in a legal and policy dispute.On the last Thursday of August, Jennifer Livovich spent the morning simmering beans and cheese sauce in her Boulder, Colo., apartment, preparing nachos. Then friends helped her load a truck with the food, along with donations she had secured — socks, toothbrushes, cellphones — to distribute at a downtown park where dozens of chronically homeless people congregate.“Hopefully, no drama,” she said as the truck pulled away.Ms. Livovich has become a central figure in Boulder’s efforts to help the homeless. In 2020, she created a nonprofit, Feet Forward, to serve several hundred people whom the county estimates lack permanent shelter. And she regularly consults with, and is consulted by, policymakers, housing officials and the Boulder County district attorney. In late November she wrote an op-ed in a local paper on homelessness and substance use. To these conversations, she brings an intimate expertise: For five years, from 2012 to 2017, she lived on the streets of Boulder, often inebriated, until a brush with frostbite scared her into treatment.“She struck a chord in Boulder that I’ve not ever seen before,” said Benita Duran, a former Boulder assistant city manager.In 2021, the American Civil Liberties Union asked Ms. Livovich and Feet Forward to join as plaintiffs in a lawsuit that would force the city to reform its homeless policies. She was told that the lawsuit was “going to change homeless lives,” she recalled. “So of course I joined.”Lawsuits like this one are increasingly common around the country, as cities grapple with stubbornly chronic homeless populations and a vexing legal and moral question: Can a person be given a ticket for sleeping in a public area? Or, as the A.C.L.U. contends, does such a policy constitute “cruel and unusual punishment” when there are not enough shelter beds to accommodate everyone in need?The issue in Boulder became further fraught in May, when Ms. Livovich told the A.C.L.U. that she was withdrawing from the lawsuit. In an interview, she said that she had signed on as a plaintiff without fully understanding the case being made — and that she now feels that the A.C.L.U. and its supporters ultimately do not understand the people that they are trying to help.Ms. Livovich argued that many people who gather and often sleep around Boulder’s downtown park represent a particular subset of “the homeless.” For them, she said, the primary problem is substance abuse; cheap, potent drugs are so readily available that the “housing first” policy oversimplifies the issue. Treatment should be the first priority and, while Ms. Livovich does not favor ticketing people sleeping outside, she said that some people might need to be removed from the park for their safety, and that of the public.“I’m not anti-housing first,” she said. “I’m not anti-housing.” But in a world of constrained resources, she added, the spending priorities need to be shifted to put greater emphasis on treatment. “There is a growing subset struggling with addiction, and I have a hard time just giving them an apartment,” she said. “That’s not going to solve their problems.”“They need treatment,” Ms. Livovich said. “Every dollar not spent on treatment is a dollar wasted.”The A.C.L.U., she added, “is looking at this through the lens of what is constitutional and not what is happening on the street.”Volunteers packed supplies for a pop-up lunch for homeless people who congregate in Central Park in Boulder.Stephen Speranza for The New York TimesTim Macdonald, the legal director for the A.C.L.U. of Colorado, countered that the lawsuit sought to combat what he called the “criminalization” of sleeping in public spaces without an alternative. Treatment was important, too, he said, and housing and treatment were not mutually exclusive. He declined to comment on what the A.C.L.U. said to Ms. Livovich when she joined the lawsuit, citing attorney-client privilege.“Our focus is to protect the constitutional rights of the plaintiffs we still represent in this case, and continue our efforts to end the criminalization of people who are unhoused in Boulder,” Mr. Macdonald said.He added that Ms. Livovich was important initially at the outset but her decision to withdraw doesn’t end the claims of other plaintiffs. Among them is Feet Forward, the nonprofit that Ms. Livovich founded. After she announced her withdrawal from the suit, she asked her board of directors to do the same. But it declined and the nonprofit stayed on as a plaintiff, and Ms. Livovich resigned from her own organization.“They hijacked my nonprofit for this lawsuit,” she said of the A.C.L.U. and its allies on the Feet Forward board. “I was played.”‘This is my park’At the park, Ms. Livovich, 51, and her team set tables under a large tree and began distributing the tortilla chips, cheese, jalapeños and other fixings.Wearing a T-shirt bearing the words “Be Kind,” she jovially greeted friends she knew from her street days as she handed out supplies to the hundred or so people waiting in line. A 54-year-old woman who gave her name as Julie clutched new socks and a muffin as she described how she had just been released from the hospital after being treated for pneumonia. An argument among several men rose in volume from somewhere nearby.In its lawsuit, the A.C.L.U. contends that “homelessness in the region is generally the result of economic conditions,” and that Boulder must first provide sufficient housing before enacting “cover bans” and issuing citations for sleeping in public spaces under blankets and other forms of cover. It characterizes the ticketing as “cruel and unusual punishment.”Boulder has countered that its police department has discretion over people sleeping in public places. In several early judgments, a district judge agreed with the city that a tent ban does not violate the state constitution but said legal arguments could continue on the question of whether people could be cited for sleeping with a blanket or other covering. A trial date is set for August.“There is no sobriety in the park,” Ms. Livovich said, looking around. Many of the people who gather there are desperately addicted, trying to stave off withdrawal, and sometimes violent and psychotic. Ms. Livovich said that the A.C.L.U. misunderstood this subset of homeless people. In Boulder County, one-half of 1 percent of the population is homeless but accounts for 10 percent of felonies in 2018-2019, according to the county district attorney.Volunteers served food in Central Park. Stephen Speranza for The New York TimesMs. Livovich has argued for streamlined services, supervised treatment when necessary and even detaining people who present a risk to themselves or others. She said the lawsuit did not prioritize the well-being of people who were at risk of dying everyday. “Nobody has constitutional rights when they’re dead,” she said.Mr. Macdonald, of the A.C.L.U., noted that some of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit had been cited for sleeping outside and that their cases “had nothing to do with drug use or illegal behavior.”The city does not keep a daily total of its homeless population, with most data collected at the county level. In January, Boulder County reported 839 people who lacked permanent shelter; around one-half stayed in a shelter and one-quarter were in transitional housing, leaving 243 people outside. People avoid shelters for many reasons, including fear of violence or constrained freedom. Drugs play a role, too, according to a city analysis: “Either the person has self-medicated into a state in which they cannot make a reasoned decision about sheltering, or they do not want to shelter because they cannot actively use the substance while staying at the shelter.”Kurt Firnhaber, head of Housing and Human Services for the city, said he endorsed “housing first” but that housing alone did not solve the problem for some people grappling with drug addiction. “Many individuals struggle to get through the night,” he said. And shelters were not always a refuge. One night this summer, Mr. Firnhaber said, a man at a local shelter “took a chair and started breaking all the glass in the building.”At the park, as Ms. Livovich’s team was cleaning up, an argument that had been escalating between two men suddenly exploded when the older of the two — who was tall, with a long white beard, and wielded a six-inch knife — began chasing the other.Ms. Livovich quickly learned the cause: There had been a fentanyl overdose in the park the night before, and the older man was chasing the dealer he thought was responsible. The police arrived and dispelled the tension. Later, Ms. Livovich said she was disappointed but not surprised by the older man’s attempt to defend the park from a perceived threat. “When I lived out here,” she said, “I used to say, ‘This is my park.’”‘Privilege’ and desperationMs. Livovitch’s organization, Feet Forward, offers services such as distributing harm reduction supplies or obtaining a shuttle bus to provide mobile outreach services.Stephen Speranza for The New York TimesMs. Livovich grew up in Hammond, Ind., her father a financial executive and mother an administrator in a law school. She described her childhood as “privileged.” She attended Indiana University briefly but dropped out.She married at 35, and the relationship was abusive. “Drinking was our common denominator,” Ms. Livovich said. She left the marriage at age 38, landing in South Bend, Ind., where “my drinking got crazy,” she said. In 2012, she came to Boulder.Her life centered on feeding her alcohol addiction. “It ruled my every move,” she said. She often woke behind King Soopers, a supermarket, and then pooled her cash with other habitual drinkers and designated someone to go inside and make the purchase. “All day, every day,” she said.People who knew her then described her as charismatic and sometimes ornery. “There are two sides of Jen — there’s sober Jen and drunk Jen,” said Brentt Van Wagner, 39, who was homeless for two dozen years until recently. When intoxicated, Ms. Livovich was “angry,” he said. “She puts her foot down a lot. Commanding — we’re going to do this, and we’re going to do it this way.” He added, “She’s a good person. She’s got a good heart.”From 2014 to 2016, Ms. Livovich received 51 citations, spent 266 nights in jail and was “hauled to detox 72 times,” she said. Some detentions “saved my life,” she said, because she stopped drinking for a few days.In December 2016, after a scare from frostbite, she entered sober transitional living, spent 18 months in recovery and enrolled at Colorado State University, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in human services. She was placed into housing in Boulder through a state voucher program. In October 2018, she started collecting socks to give to the homeless.In late 2020 that effort grew into Feet Forward, whose mission expanded to provide food and other staples. It coordinated with Boulder County to provide clean needles and other harm reduction supplies, soliciting items from donors and obtaining a shuttle bus to provide mobile outreach services.“She has a wealth of knowledge of working with people in trenches around the homeless,” said Michael Dougherty, the Boulder County district attorney, who said he has had multiple conversations with Ms. Livovich over the years.Her manner could be direct. “She’s good at calling everybody out in the room who thinks they know better,” said Molly East, executive director of Focused Reentry, a nonprofit that helps people transition from incarceration to society. “Her lived experience is fundamental to solving things.”A familiar storyMs. Livovich is working with a new nonprofit, Street Scape, that she hopes will give her a platform to continue helping Boulder’s homeless population.Stephen Speranza for The New York TimesLast spring, after Ms. Livovich withdrew from the lawsuit, she asked the board of Feet Forward to do the same. When they declined, she asked the board members to resign so that she could replace them. Only one — Ms. Duran, the former assistant city manager — did so.“Jen kept raising the issue and saying, ‘This isn’t right. I don’t want to be involved,’” Ms. Duran said. In the end, Ms. Livovich herself resigned, to follow her own “moral compass,” she said.Darren O’Connor, a board member, sent an email to Feet Forward volunteers. “The board was saddened to receive this resignation,” he wrote, adding, “It was important for Feet Forward to remain as a named plaintiff, as deciding to withdraw would require dismissal of the lawsuit.” Later, Mr. O’Connor said, the board learned that the lawsuit could have proceeded even if the nonprofit had dropped out.In August, when Ms. Livovich marshaled supplies to give to the homeless, she did so under the aegis of a new nonprofit, Street Scape, that she hoped would give her and her team a platform to continue helping.Ten days later, Ms. Livovich started drinking. Over the next week, her drinking was intermittent but consistent. She sat in a recliner in her apartment sipping 100-proof peppermint schnapps from the bottle or a tumbler, her laptop and cigarettes nearby.This was not her first relapse, she said, but she had been largely sober for four years until the troubles started over the lawsuit. “I was so devastated,” she said. After resigning from Feet Forward, she relapsed badly, went into rehab and got sober again, briefly.“The one thing that I had is gone,” she said, her voice slurring, eyes heavy. She had developed a mission and organization, and felt it had been taken from her. “I don’t have a place,” she said.Friends, including local officials, checked in to remind her that she played a vital role in the community. With their support, Ms. Livovich found her way into a detox program and then started intensive work through Alcoholics Anonymous, aiming to attend 30 meetings in 30 days. Soon she was sober and “fighting for my life,” she said in a text. “Root for me.”While she was in detox, she overheard soon-to-be-released substance users on a phone in the public area desperately calling around to find placement in long-term clinics but coming up empty. She worried for them. “The moments for recovery are fleeting,” she said. Some people may lose motivation. “And where are they going?” she said. “They’re going back to the park.”As the weeks went by, Ms. Livovich struggled to find a Medicaid-supported therapist and a clinician to prescribe drugs for depression and anxiety, and those that might help reduce her alcohol cravings. She said there were not enough treatment options and she couldn’t find help. She made it 64 days sober, and then she relapsed again just before Thanksgiving. A few days after the holiday, she fell in her apartment, hit her head and cut the inside of her mouth, leading to an emergency room visit. Friends got her back into detox. One of them, a physician, pulled some strings and got her an appointment with a therapist and a clinician during the first week of December.“Look at how difficult it has been for me to get treatment, and I’m relatively well connected,” Ms. Livovich said. “Imagine what it looks like for somebody who knows nobody but other guys that are getting high in the park.”

A major lawsuit against Meta has placed a spotlight on our fraught relationship with online social information.A group of 41 states and the District of Columbia filed suit on Tuesday against Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, contending that the company knowingly used features on its platforms to cause children to use them compulsively, even as the company said that its social media sites were safe for young people.“Meta has harnessed powerful and unprecedented technologies to entice, engage and ultimately ensnare youth and teens,” the states said in their lawsuit filed in federal court. “Its motive is profit.”The accusations in the lawsuit raise a deeper question about behavior: Are young people becoming addicted to social media and the internet? Here’s what the research has found.What Makes Social Media So Compelling?Experts who study internet use say that the magnetic allure of social media arises from the way the content plays to our neurological impulses and wiring, such that consumers find it hard to turn away from the incoming stream of information.David Greenfield, a psychologist and founder of the Center for Internet and Technology Addiction in West Hartford, Conn., said the devices lure users with some powerful tactics. One is “intermittent reinforcement,” which creates the idea that a user could get a reward at any time. But when the reward comes is unpredictable. “Just like a slot machine,” he said. As with a slot machine, users are beckoned with lights and sounds but, even more powerful, information and reward tailored to a user’s interests and tastes.Adults are susceptible, he noted, but young people are particularly at risk, because the brain regions that are involved in resisting temptation and reward are not nearly as developed in children and teenagers as in adults. “They’re all about impulse and not a lot about the control of that impulse,” Dr. Greenfield said of young consumers.Moreover, he said, the adolescent brain is especially attuned to social connections, and “social media is all a perfect opportunity to connect with other people.”Meta responded to the lawsuit by saying that it had taken many steps to support families and teenagers. “We’re disappointed that instead of working productively with companies across the industry to create clear, age-appropriate standards for the many apps teens use, the attorneys general have chosen this path,” the company said in a statement.Does Compulsion Equal Addiction?For many years, the scientific community typically defined addiction in relation to substances, such as drugs, and not behaviors, such as gambling or internet use. That has gradually changed. In 2013, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the official reference for mental health conditions, introduced the idea of internet gaming addiction but said that more study was warranted before the condition could be formally declared.A subsequent study explored broadening the definition to “internet addiction.” The author suggested further exploring diagnostic criteria and the language, noting, for instance, that terms like “problematic use” and even the word “internet” were open to broad interpretation, given the many forms the information and its delivery can take.Dr. Michael Rich, the director of the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children’s Hospital, said he discouraged the use of the word “addiction” because the internet, if used effectively and with limits, was not merely useful but also essential to everyday life. “I prefer the term ‘Problematic Internet Media Use,” he said, a term that has gained currency in recent years.Dr. Greenfield agreed that there clearly are valuable uses for the internet and that the definition of how much is too much can vary. But he said there also were clearly cases where excessive use interferes with school, sleep and other vital aspects of a healthy life. Too many young consumers “can’t put it down,” he said. “The internet is a giant hypodermic, and the content, including social media like Meta, are the psychoactive drugs.”

The NewsAn Oxford University researcher and her team showed that digital wearable devices can track the progression of Parkinson’s disease in an individual more effectively than human clinical observation can, according to a newly published paper.By tracking more than 100 metrics picked up by the devices, researchers were able to discern subtle changes in the movements of subjects with Parkinson’s, a neurodegenerative disease that afflicts 10 million people worldwide.The lead researcher emphasized that the latest findings were not a treatment for Parkinson’s. Rather, they are a means of helping scientists gauge whether novel drugs and other therapies for Parkinson’s are slowing the progression of the disease.Quotable QuotesThe sensors — six per subject, worn on the chest, at the base of the spine and one on each wrist and foot — tracked 122 physiological metrics. Several dozen metrics stood out as closely indicating the disease’s progression, including the direction a toe moved during a step and the length and regularity of strides.“We have the biomarker,” said Chrystalina Antoniades, a neuroscientist at the University of Oxford and the lead researcher on the paper, which was published earlier this month in the journal npj Parkinson’s Disease. “It’s super exciting. Now we hope to be able to tell you: Is a drug working?”Until now, Dr. Antoniades said, drug trials for Parkinson’s had relied on clinical assessment of whether a treatment was slowing the progression of the disease. But clinical observation can miss changes that happen day to day or that might not show up clearly in periodic visits to a doctor, she added.In the paper, the study’s authors concluded that the sensors proved more effective at tracking the disease progression “than the conventionally used clinical rating scales.”What It Looks LikeTo capture the wearer’s various movements, the sensors employed technologies, including accelerometers and gyroscopes, that have become increasingly common in digital watches and smartphones. Together, these devices can measure a person’s direction, gait, regularity of movement and more.After the results were published, Dr. Antoniades and her team were flooded with messages from colleagues and media outlets asking whether they had found a cure for Parkinson’s. She said she wanted to be clear that the advance, while important, was a tool that could hasten the development of treatments for the disease, but that it was not the answer to it.What’s NextDr. Antoniades said she was optimistic about the possibility of using such sensors to track other illnesses, perhaps even Alzheimer’s — a “plethora of diseases that bring together bioengineering, clinical science and movement science.”Human doctors will remain a vital part of the process, she added, with sensors complementing the observations of clinicians. The hope, Dr. Antoniades said, “is this will enhance the ability of your doctor to get it right.”

The NewsApproximately 20 percent of adolescents had symptoms of major depressive disorder in 2021 — the first full calendar year of the pandemic — but less than half who needed treatment received it, according to a new study.The research, published in JAMA Pediatrics, found that treatment was most lacking for minority adolescents, particularly those who are Latino and mixed-race.Christopher Capozziello for The New York TimesBackground: Depression was already on the riseMajor depressive disorder is a chronic condition that surfaces in episodes of depressed mood and loss of joy, with symptoms lasting at least two weeks. It is distinct from persistent depressive disorder, in which symptoms last two years or more.Previous research showed that the prevalence of major depressive disorder among adolescents nearly doubled recently, rising to 15.8 percent in 2019 from 8.1 percent in 2009. The Covid-19 pandemic amplified this trend as it caused isolation, uncertainty, loneliness and fear of illness among family members.The Findings: Treatment gaps persist, especially for minority teensThe new study on the prevalence of major depressive disorder in 2021 drew from a nationally representative sample of 10,700 adolescents, ages 12 to 17, whose experiences were recorded by the National Survey on Drug Use and Health.The study found some sharp differences in the prevalence of the condition across racial and ethnic groups. About 14.5 percent of Black adolescents, 14.6 percent of Asian adolescents and 20 percent of white adolescents reported symptoms of major depressive disorder. Latino adolescents experienced major depressive disorder at a slightly higher rate, around 23 percent.Though mixed-race and Latino adolescents had the highest rates of major depressive disorder, they had the lowest rates of treatment, the study found. Twenty-one percent of mixed-race adolescents and 29 percent of Latino adolescents with the condition received treatment for it, compared with nearly half of white adolescents. Treatment rates for Asian and Black adolescents fell in between.The study overlaps with previous research that found that adolescents from racial and ethnic minorities had fewer treatment options than their white peers did, with the most glaring gaps for teens living in lower-income communities.What’s Next: Addressing the inequitiesThe authors of the study called for policymakers to recognize the inequities in treatment that were “highlighted” by the pandemic. “As we move forward,” they concluded in the paper, “policy and clinical efforts should target adolescents as a whole and marginalized populations in particular, to ensure timely access to high-quality mental health treatment.”

The NewsMany online marijuana dispensaries do not enforce age limits on purchases, and they have other lax policies that enable minors to buy cannabis on the internet, according to a new study published on Monday in The Journal of the American Medical Association Pediatrics.Robyn Beck/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe NumbersThe research examined the age-verification policies and other practices of 80 online dispensaries, based in 32 states, that sell marijuana to American customers.The study found that 18.8 percent of dispensaries, or nearly one in five, “required no formal age verification at any stage of the purchasing process.” And that more than 80 percent accepted “nontraceable” payment methods, like prepaid cards or cash, thus “enabling youth to hide their transactions,” the authors noted.Of the dispensaries studied, nearly one-third allowed delivery across state lines — and of those, 95 percent offered delivery to states with marijuana laws different from the home state of the online dispensary. Five percent of the dispensaries provided student discounts.The ContextHealth officials have expressed concerns about the effects of marijuana use on the developing brain, particularly in an era of increased drug potency and widespread legalization. According to a 2022 survey funded by the National Institutes of Health, 6.3 percent of 12th graders reported using cannabis daily in 2021, as did 2.1 percent of 10th graders and 0.7 percent of eighth graders.Periodic use was lower. About one-third of high school seniors had used marijuana at least once in 2021, along with 20 percent of 10th graders and 8.3 percent of eighth graders.The use of marijuana in these age groups fell during the pandemic; one theory is that young people had a harder time obtaining drugs, including marijuana, and consuming them outside supervision.What’s NextOnline marijuana sales, and the ease of shipping, would seem to make it easier for minors to access the drug, the study’s authors noted. “It is imperative,” they wrote in their conclusion, “to require strict age-verification procedures prior to cannabis purchases online and to establish stringent surveillance of online marijuana dispensaries to protect youth.”In the interim, they added, “pediatricians and caregivers must be aware of the widespread availability of online dispensaries and potential dissemination of marijuana to minors.”

La noticiaSegún un estudio publicado el mes pasado en The Journal of the American Medical Association Pediatrics, los niños de 1 año expuestos a más de cuatro horas diarias frente a una pantalla experimentaron retrasos en el desarrollo de las capacidades de comunicación y resolución de problemas a los 2 y 4 años.La investigación también reveló que los niños de 1 año que estuvieron expuestos más tiempo frente a una pantalla que sus compañeros presentaron retrasos a los 2 años en el desarrollo de la motricidad fina y las habilidades personales y sociales. Sin embargo, estos retrasos parecían disiparse a los 4 años.El estudio no encontró que el tiempo frente a una pantalla causara los retrasos en el desarrollo, sino más bien que hay una relación entre un mayor tiempo de exposición frente a una pantalla con los retrasos en el desarrollo de los bebés. Según los expertos, este patrón podría explicarlo el valor del tiempo cara a cara para los niños pequeños.La investigación también encontró que los niños de 1 año expuestos a más tiempo frente a una pantalla que sus compañeros mostraban retrasos a los 2 años en el desarrollo de la motricidad fina y las habilidades personales y sociales.Kike Calvo/Alamy¿Por qué es importante?David J. Lewkowicz, psicólogo del desarrollo del Centro de Estudios Infantiles de la Universidad de Yale, afirmó que la interacción cara a cara entre padres e hijos es crucial para darles un valioso conjunto de información a los bebés, incluida la manera en cómo las expresiones faciales, las palabras, el tono de voz y la retroalimentación física se combinan para expresar lenguaje y significado.“Esto no ocurre cuando estás viendo una pantalla”, comentó y agregó que no le sorprendían los resultados de la investigación.Los hallazgos, de investigadores japoneses, se extrajeron de cuestionarios sobre desarrollo y tiempo frente a una pantalla que se entregaron a los padres de casi 8000 niños pequeños. En general, se descubrió que los bebés expuestos a mayores niveles de tiempo frente a una pantalla eran hijos de madres primerizas más jóvenes, con menores ingresos y niveles de educación en el hogar y de quienes sufrían de depresión posparto. (Se reportó que apenas el cuatro por ciento de los bebés estuvo expuesto a pantallas durante cuatro o más horas al día, mientras que el 18 por ciento pasó entre dos y menos de cuatro horas frente a una pantalla al día y la mayoría, menos de dos horas).El estudio destacó una “asociación dosis-respuesta” entre el tiempo frente a una pantalla y los retrasos en el desarrollo: mientras más tiempo los bebés pasaban frente a una pantalla, más probabilidades había de que presentaran retrasos en el desarrollo.¿Qué sigue?Los autores del estudio señalaron que la investigación no distinguía entre el tiempo frente a una pantalla que tenía como objetivo ser educativo y el tiempo frente a una pantalla más enfocado al entretenimiento. Los investigadores agregaron que los estudios futuros debían explorar esta perspectiva.Según Lewkowicz, los padres por lo regular le preguntan cuánto tiempo de pantalla es el adecuado. Su respuesta: “Habla con tu hijo lo más que puedas, cara a cara todo lo que puedas”, mencionó.Pedirles a los padres que priven todo el tiempo de pantallas a sus hijos es poco práctico, afirmó: “Nadie le hará caso a eso. Tiene que ser con moderación. Con una fuerte dosis de interacción social en la vida real”.Matt Richtel es un escritor y reportero ganador del Premio Pulitzer radicado en San Francisco. Se unió al Times en 2000 y su trabajo se ha centrado en la ciencia, la tecnología, los negocios y la narración de historias en torno a estos temas. Más sobre Matt Richtel

The NewsMore than one-fifth of people who use cannabis struggle with dependency or problematic use, according to a study published on Tuesday in The Journal of the American Medical Association Network Open.The research found that 21 percent of people in the study had some degree of cannabis use disorder, which clinicians characterize broadly as problematic use of cannabis that leads to a variety of symptoms, such as recurrent social and occupational problems, indicating impairment and distress. In the study, 6.5 percent of users suffered moderate to severe disorder.Cannabis users who experience more severe dependency tended to be recreational users, whereas less severe but still problematic use was associated roughly equally with medical and recreational use. The most common symptoms among both groups were increased tolerance, craving, and uncontrolled escalation of cannabis use.T.J. Kirkpatrick for The New York TimesBackgroundCannabis use is rising nationwide as more states have legalized it. The new findings align with prior research, which has found that around 20 percent of cannabis users develop cannabis use disorder. The condition can be treated with detoxification and abstinence, therapies and other treatments that work with addictive behaviors.The new study drew its data from nearly 1,500 primary care patients in Washington State, where recreational use is legal, in an effort to explore the prevalence of cannabis use disorder among both medical and nonmedical users. The research found that 42 percent of cannabis users identified themselves solely as medical users; 25 percent identified as nonmedical users, and 32 percent identified as both recreational and medical users.What’s Next“The results here underscore the importance of assessing patient cannabis use and CUD symptoms in medical settings,” the study concluded. That finding is consistent with prior research that urged people to learn about the risks of developing cannabis use disorder, particularly “among those who initiate early and use frequently during adolescence.”