Acute effects of cannabis on speech illusions and psychotic-like symptoms: two studies testing the moderating effects of cannabidiol and adolescence.

Background: Acute cannabis administration can produce transient psychotic-like effects in healthy individuals. However, the mechanisms through which this occurs and which factors predict vulnerability remain unclear. We investigate whether cannabis inhalation leads to psychotic-like symptoms and speech illusion; and whether cannabidiol (CBD) blunts such effects (study 1) and adolescence heightens such effects (study 2).

Frontal lobe dysfunction as a predictor of depression and anxiety following temporal lobe epilepsy surgery.

Objective: Predictors of psychiatric outcome following TLE surgery have proved elusive and represent a current challenge in the practice of TLE surgery. This prospective study investigated whether frontal lobe dysfunction is predictive of poorer psychiatric outcomes.

Methods: Forty-nine unilateral TLE surgical patients were assessed using the Beck Depression Inventory-Fast Screen (BDI-FS) and Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) preoperatively and 6 and 12 months postoperatively.

Cannabis Dampens the Effects of Music in Brain Regions Sensitive to Reward and Emotion.

Background: Despite the current shift towards permissive cannabis policies, few studies have investigated the pleasurable effects users seek. Here, we investigate the effects of cannabis on listening to music, a rewarding activity that frequently occurs in the context of recreational cannabis use. We additionally tested how these effects are influenced by cannabidiol, which may offset cannabis-related harms.

Factors affecting seizure outcome after epilepsy surgery: an observational series.

Importance: Surgical treatment can bring seizure remission in people with focal epilepsy but requires careful selection of candidates.

Objectives: To determine which preoperative factors are associated with postoperative seizure outcome.

Design: We audited seizure outcome of 693 adults who had resective epilepsy surgery between 1990 and 2010 and used survival analysis to detect preoperatively identifiable risk factors of poor seizure outcome.

Acute and chronic effects of cannabinoids on effort-related decision-making and reward learning: an evaluation of the cannabis 'amotivational' hypotheses.

Rationale: Anecdotally, both acute and chronic cannabis use have been associated with apathy, amotivation, and other reward processing deficits. To date, empirical support for these effects is limited, and no previous studies have assessed both acute effects of Δ-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD), as well as associations with cannabis dependence.

Objectives: The objectives of this study were (1) to examine acute effects of cannabis with CBD (Cann + CBD) and without CBD (Cann-CBD) on effort-related decision-making and (2) to examine associations between cannabis dependence, effort-related decision-making and reward learning.

Neural correlates of de novo depression following left temporal lobe epilepsy surgery: a voxel based morphometry study of pre-surgical structural MRI.

Purpose: To investigate cerebral grey matter (GM) volumetric abnormalities in temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) patients who develop de novo depression following TLE surgery using voxel-based morphometry (VBM).

Methods: We retrospectively examined pre-surgical grey matter (GM) volumes in 30 patients with TLE due to unilateral left-sided hippocampal sclerosis using 1.5-T MRI scan, which were segmented with optimised VBM parameters and normalised to a sample template using DARTEL, with SPM8 software.

Examination of costs for a lay health educator-delivered translation of the Diabetes Prevention Program in senior centers.

Objective: Older adults in the U.S. have high rates of obesity.

Health information exchange reduces repeated diagnostic imaging for back pain.

Study Objective: This study seeks to determine whether health information exchange reduces repeated diagnostic imaging and related costs in emergency back pain evaluation.

Methods: This was a longitudinal data analysis of health information exchange patient-visit data. All repeated emergency department (ED) patient visits for back pain with previous ED diagnostic imaging to a Memphis metropolitan area ED between August 1, 2007, and July 31, 2009, were included.

Does health information exchange reduce unnecessary neuroimaging and improve quality of headache care in the emergency department?

Background: Health information exchange (HIE) is advocated as an approach to reduce unnecessary testing and improve quality of emergency department (ED) care, but little evidence supports its use. Headache is a specific condition for which HIE has theoretical benefits.

Objective: To determine whether health information exchange (HIE) reduces potentially unnecessary neuroimaging, increases adherence with evidence-based guidelines, and decreases costs in the emergency department (ED) evaluation of headache.

Potentially avoidable hospitalizations in Tennessee: analysis of prevalence disparities associated with gender, race, and insurance.

Objectives: We determined (1) the relative rates of potentially avoidable hospitalizations (PAHs) in Tennessee; (2) relative rates of PAHs among gender, race, and insurance subgroups; and (3) adjusted population-based relative rates of PAHs, taking into account the influences of unobservable factors such as patient preferences, physician practice patterns, and availability of hospital beds that can also affect PAHs.

Methods: We applied the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's definitions of ambulatory care sensitive conditions (ACSCs) to Tennessee hospitalization records to identify PAHs. Patient discharge records for 2002 came from Tennessee's Hospital Discharge Data System.