Study finds insightful psychedelic experience may improve mental health

EurekaAlert! has this notice about this study on the effects the psychedelic experience has on anxiety and depression.  From the abstract:

The present analysis suggests that psychedelic experiences, in particular those that are associated with enduring improvements in mental health, may be characterized by reproducible and predictable subtypes of the subjective psychedelic effects. These subtypes appear to be significantly different with respect to the baseline demographic characteristics, baseline measures of mental health, and drug type and dose. These findings also suggest that efforts to increase psychedelic associated personal and mystical insight experiences may be key to maximizing beneficial impact of clinical approaches using this treatment in their patients.

 Cheers, 

Colin

Naked Mole Rat and Fertility

EurekAlert! drew my attention to this study on the fertility of naked mole rats.  Females demonstrate no decline in fertility for the majority (perhaps all) of of their decades-long lifespan.  From the news item:  

“Naked mole-rats are the weirdest mammals,” said lead author Miguel Brieño-Enríquez, M.D., Ph.D., assistant professor at Magee-Womens Research Institute and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine’s Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences. “They’re the longest-lived rodent, they almost never get cancer, they don’t feel pain like other mammals, they live in underground colonies, and only the queen can have babies. But to me, the most amazing thing is that they never stop having babies — they don’t have a drop in fertility as they age. We want to understand how they do this.”

Cheers

Colin

(Forthcoming Paper on) "The War Against Disease" and the Plasticity of Public Health's "Ecology of Ideas"

I was very pleased to learn this morning that I my latest journal submission, a Perspectives article, has been accepted for publication in the The Journals of Gerontology. Series A, Biological Sciences.  

This journal is one of a few published by the The Gerontological Society of America. And it is a pleasure to have my work published in this journal again, which, in my personal experience, has always shown itself to be run very professionally- highly efficient and always provides expert feedback from both referees and Associate Editors throughout the review and revision processes.  Each time my submissions  have been significantly improved as a result of the insightful feedback I received during the review process. 

Here is the abstract of the paper:

In his 1910 JAMA Address the physician and pathologist Christian Herter (1865-1910) emphasized the importance of plasticity in science.  Herter’s insight is significant for understanding how public health’s “ecology of ideas” must evolve and change as the health challenges facing populations alters through the different stages of “epidemiologic transition” (Omran 1971).  The foundational moral aspiration (i.e. disease control) and intellectual suppositions (e.g. that public health is “purchasable”) of the early twentieth century public health pioneers C-E.A Winslow (1877-1957) and his mentor Hermann Biggs (1859-1923) were shaped by sanitation science and were deployed to mitigate the risks of early-life mortality.  But to meet the health challenges of today’s ageing world, public health’s “ecology of ideas” must be plastic, and thus open to revision and refinement in terms of both its foundational moral aspirations and the intellectual suppositions concerning how to best improve population health.  More medical research is needed in rate (of ageing) control vs disease control (Comfort 1969). 

Cheers, 

Colin     

Journal of Population Ageing Paper Published

My latest journal article in the Journal of Population Ageing is now available on the "online first" section of the journal.  My hope is that this article will help re-orient geroscience advocacy within the public health paradigm by detailing the different ways rate (of ageing) control could improve the health and wellbeing of the 4+ billion females currently alive in the world today.  While women life longer than men (4.8 years globally), women survive with poorer health in late life.  No doubt this will be an issue I explore again in future research.   

Cheers, 

Colin