The U.K. health technology assessment body has given its approval to the use of nine digital health products for treating mental disorders, enabling them to get conditional reimbursement in the National Health Service (NHS), while real world evidence of their cost effectiveness is collected.
Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences and Shanghaitech University have identified dopamine D2 receptor and/or 5-HT receptor agonists reported to be useful for the treatment of depression and schizophrenia.
Psilera Inc. has announced animal findings for its first cohort of drug candidates designed and synthesized in-house showing that they are non-hallucinogenic. This group includes six patent-pending compounds with novel structural features across four compound families.
The U.S. FDA granted Sooma Oy breakthrough device designation for its patient-administered neuromodulation device to treat depression. Sooma Depression Therapy uses a mild electrical current to stimulate targeted brain areas, resulting in a significant improvement in depressive symptoms.
The steadily percolating psychedelic drug space stands poised to generate a near-term stream of potentially encouraging developments in a range of mental health disorders, including depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and more.
Researchers at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have been able to identify proteins that were released from muscles during exercise in relatively small quantities. Using their method, the team was able to demonstrate that the neurotrophic factor prosaposin was produced during exercise. Prosaposin is “a well-known CNS neurotrophic factor, but has never been seen to come out of muscle or fat,” Bruce Spiegelman told BioWorld. Spiegelman is a researcher at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Stanley J. Korsmeyer Professor of Cell Biology and Medicine at Harvard Medical School.
Gilgamesh Pharmaceuticals Inc. has identified arylcyclo-hexylamine derivatives targeting N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) and/or serotonin transporter (SERT) reported to be useful for the treatment of substance abuse and dependence, depression and mood and anxiety disorders.
A strong clinical association has been observed between epilepsy and the development of depression, however, it is difficult to study individual molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying these comorbidities in animal models. Researchers from Rutgers University have aimed to develop a cell-type-specific monogenic mouse model of epilepsy and depression comorbidities, which could serve as a tool for identifying disease mechanisms as well as for target and drug screening.
