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The expanded scope of the Medicaid program has accomplished a great deal in bolstering substance use treatment, but further progress will depend on correcting deficiencies in non‐expansion states and within Medicaid managed care entities, a newly published commentary suggests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Last week, ADAW featured a published paper recommending that higher doses of buprenorphine be used in the era of fentanyl (see "ASAM recommends higher doses if needed for treatment with buprenorphine," ADAW, Jan. 7, 2024, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/adaw.33984). The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) did not have time to get back to us by deadline but did respond to our questions for this week's issue. Below are our questions, in italics, followed by their responses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonnative, invasive ants, and especially the red imported fire ant, Solenopsis invicta, are a widespread threat to ground‐nesting wildlife. In this paper I describe a method of controlling fire ants using hot water. The hot water approach was applied to reduce fire ant impacts on sea turtles and ground‐nesting songbirds and to demonstrate its utility in protection of different ground‐nesting species in different habitats. Fire ant controls using hot water provided 90% or greater control, significantly improving survival of both turtle and bird hatchlings, without the use of pesticides. The success of the method and the availability of necessary equipment shows that hot water control of fire ant populations should be considered as a tool for wildlife affected by fire ants and is useful for a wide variety of scenarios where fire ant controls are desirable or necessary. The method does require that 1) wildlife nest locations are known and that 2) nearby fire ant colonies can be found and treated with hot water. The method can be used as a complement to broadcast or bait‐station baiting strategies or as a stand‐alone method for managing fire ants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Precision agriculture tools like decision support systems increasingly use machine‐learning algorithms and other types of artificial intelligence (AI) to analyze large quantities of agricultural data and provide recommendations to producers and crop advisers. However, several barriers threaten adoption of these tools. Three papers in the recent Agronomy Journal special section, "Machine Learning in Agriculture," explore this phenomenon and offer solutions and opportunities for building trust in these technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As Scott E. Hadland, M.D., senior author of a dramatic paper published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine puts it, drug use among adolescents is not getting more common — it's at its lowest in almost 50 years. But it's getting more deadly, due to fentanyl. In "The Overdose Crisis among U.S. Adolescents," by Hadland and lead author Joseph Friedman, Ph.D., the problem is laid out clearly: After guns and car crashes, overdose (OD) deaths are now the third leading cause of death among adolescents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Can bird‐watching improve mental health? A new study has found that people who have nature‐based experiences report better well‐being and lower psychological distress than those who do not, a North Carolina State University news release stated. Bird‐watching in particular yielded promising results, with higher gains in subjective well‐being and more reduction in distress than more generic nature exposure, such as walks. Because bird‐watching is an easily accessible activity, the results are encouraging for college students, who are among those most likely to suffer from mental health problems, the news release indicated. "Bird‐watching is among the most ubiquitous ways that human beings interact with wildlife globally, and college campuses provide a pocket where there's access to that activity even in more urban setting, said Nils Peterson, corresponding author of the study and a professor of forestry and environmental resources at North Carolina State University. The paper, "Birdwatching linked to increased psychological well‐being on college campuses: A pilot‐scale experimental study," was published in Environmental Psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry's (AACAP's) Program Committee has issued a Call for Papers for submission of abstracts of original investigations for consideration in the 2024 Annual Meeting of AACAP, October 14‐19, in Seattle. AACAP is planning for an in‐person meeting in Seattle and as such, will require all presenters to be in‐person in Seattle for their presentation. The Call for Papers deadline is Feb. 15, 2024 (11:59 p.m. EST). For more information, visit https://aacap.confex.com/aacap/2024/cfp.cgi. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kids playing too many video games and spending too much time online has long concerned parents, but new research has found that these activities may be associated with psychotic experiences, Newsweek reported. Teenagers who spend a lot of time playing video games and on the computer are more likely to have a psychotic experience, according to a new paper in JAMA Psychiatry. These psychotic experiences ranged in extremity from mild suspiciousness and bizarre ideas to delusions and hallucinations. The researchers studied a cohort of 1,226 participants born between 1997 and 1998, and found that those who played more video games, and those who increased then decreased their computer usage, were more likely to have a psychotic experience at some point before the age of 23. Between 5% and 7% of adults have had a psychotic experience at some point, with the first often occurring during teenage years. Psychotic experiences or episodes often involve hallucinations, delusions, disorganized thinking, paranoia and depressive moods. "Understanding the environmental determinants and psychosocial functions of media use during adolescence may help better integrate digital technologies in the prevention and management of [psychotic experiences]," the authors wrote. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From 2017 – 2022, law enforcement seizures across the United States of mushrooms containing psilocybin increased dramatically, according to a new study funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). The number of law enforcement seizures increased from 402 seizures in 2017 to 1,396 in 2022. In addition, the total weight of psilocybin mushrooms seized by law enforcement increased from 226 kg (498 lbs.) seized in 2017 compared with 844 kg (1,861 lbs.) in 2022. This analysis, published in Drug and Alcohol Dependence, was led by researchers at New York University (NYU) Langone Health in New York City, and the University of Florida, Gainesville. The data used for the analysis were collected through the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) program, a grant program aimed at reducing drug trafficking and misuse administered by the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Though law enforcement seizures do not necessarily reflect prevalence of use, they represent an indicator of the availability of illicit drugs. "We are in the middle of a rapidly evolving cultural, media, and legal landscape when it comes to psychedelics, and we need data to help shape informed and appropriate public health strategies," said NIDA Director Nora D. Volkow, M.D., in announcing the research publication last week. "Moving forward, we must continue to track data on the availability of psychedelics, patterns in use, and associated health effects to guide efforts in promoting accurate education and reducing potential harms among people who do plan to use psychedelic drugs." Adverse effects of psilocybin mushrooms, such as "bad trips," are marked by "distorted thinking, perceptual changes, putting oneself in physical danger, and intense feelings of fear, anxiety, and confusion," according to NIDA. "People who take psychedelic drugs like psilocybin may also experience short‐term side effects such as raised blood pressure and heart rate, agitation, confusion, vomiting, or nausea, which may be severe and require medical attention." Joseph J. Palamar, Ph.D., M.P.H., associate professor at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine, co‐investigator on the NIDA‐funded National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS), and lead author on the paper, said "Research studies suggesting its effectiveness in treating mental health issues and extensive positive media coverage may lead some people to seek 'shrooms' outside of medical contexts. People who use psilocybin outside of medical supervision need to be educated about risks associated with use." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]