A 2026 cross-sectional study involving 428 employed adults found that poor sleepers reported a median 292.8 mg/day of caffeine, compared with 176.1 mg/day among good sleepers, and total caffeine intake still predicted higher Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index scores after adjustment (β = 0.147, p = 0.003). The source breakdown is the useful part: black coffee, …
A 2026 Scientific Reports paper involving 1,205 participants found that people using GLP-1-style weight-loss medication were judged as less effortful, less moral, less competent, less warm, less deserving, and less attractive as cooperation partners after the same 20 kg weight loss described for a diet-and-exercise-only comparator. Research Highlights Same weight loss, harsher judgment: Tissot et …
A 2026 PRISMA-compliant systematic review and meta-analysis in Drug and Alcohol Review consolidated 30 publications covering 202 prevalence estimates from 120,041 South African adolescents: pooled lifetime prevalence was 35.09% for alcohol use, 25.47% for tobacco use, and 10.47% for cannabis use.1 Research Highlights 30 publications, 202 estimates: pooled data covered 120,041 South African adolescents. Alcohol …
Statins do not look like a dementia-prevention drug, but they do not look like a dementia hazard either. In 322,358 Kaiser Permanente Northern California patients followed for an average of 11.8 years, dementia diagnoses rose right after statins were started, then flattened: after the first year, the hazard ratio for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias …
A 12-week randomized pilot trial in 60 Veterans with depression and psychiatric polypharmacy found that 30% had an actionable antidepressant gene-drug interaction, but immediate access to pharmacogenomic results did not clearly change prescribing or Patient Health Questionnaire-9 depression scores compared with delayed access.1 Research Highlights Actionable PGx results were common: 18 of 60 Veterans, or …
The endogenous opioid system has been a candidate target for novel anxiety treatments, but a 2026 placebo-controlled crossover fMRI study in 38 healthy volunteers ran opposite the hypothesis: instead of increasing threat-related distress and amygdala reactivity, 50 mg oral naltrexone reduced subjective distress during cognitive reappraisal (p = 0.044, d = 0.57) and shifted ventromedial …
Intranasal esketamine — FDA-approved for treatment-resistant depression in 2019 — failed cost-effectiveness benchmarks against four cheaper third-line options in a 2026 Hong Kong modeling study, with incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) of US$134,127 to US$312,750 per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) at a US$50,000/QALY willingness-to-pay (WTP) threshold.1 Combination antidepressant therapy was the most cost-effective strategy modeled. Research Highlights …