It’s known by the street name “gas station heroin,” but a new government report finds the highly addictive supplement Neptune’s Fix may also contain synthetic pot. The product has already been linked to seizures, brain swelling and hallucinations, researchers reported Thursday in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, a publication of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC report centered on a 2023 investigation of 17 adults in New Jersey who had severe reactions after consuming Neptune’s Fix or similar products containing tianeptine. Thirteen were hospitalized in intensive care as a result. Tianeptine, an antidepressant that can act like an opioid, is sold as a dietary supplement at gas stations and convenience stores across the United States. It’s often marketed for pain relief, depression or anxiety. While not approved for use in the United States, it is approved for use in some European, Asian and Latin American countries.  In the CDC study, doctors in New Jersey tested six samples of Neptune’s Fix consumed by two of the patients. They discovered the presence of more than tianeptine: kavain, a substance used for anxiety, and two different types of synthetic pot were also detected in the test samples.  “It was a surprise to find those compounds in there at all,” senior study author Dr. Diane Calello, medical director of the New Jersey Poison Control Center, told NBC…  read on >  read on >

It might take a combination of treatments to rein in problem acne in teens and adults, updated guidelines from the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) suggest. The guidelines on the all-too-common condition (acne affects 85% of teens and many adults) haven’t undergone a revision since 2016. The 2024 updates include “discussion of new topical medications, which are directly applied to the skin, and systemic treatments, which are taken by mouth,” explained Dr. John Barbieri, co-chair of the AAD’s Acne Guideline Workgroup. The new updates are all evidence-based, with 18 recommendations in all. Four items fell under the guidelines’ “strong recommendation” header: The use of benzoyl peroxide creams to curb the amount of acne-linked bacteria on the skin The use of retinoid creams such as adapalene, tretinoin, tazarotene and trifarotene, to help clear pores and lower inflammation Oral antibiotics such as doxycycline, as well as antbiotic creams, to also help lower bacteria levels and inflammation Combination use, as needed, of all of the above The AAD also had five “good practice” recommendations for dermatologists when treating acne: The guidelines advise “combining multiple different treatment types, as this can lead to better results.” Use antibiotics sparingly, because overuse can trigger resistant strains of bacteria Using benzoyl peroxide alongside an antibiotic can lessen the risk for resistance Patients plagued by larger acne bumps may need injected corticosteroid therapy…  read on >  read on >

Advanced brain recording techniques have revealed how neurons in the human brain work together to produce speech. The recordings provide a detailed map of how people think about what words they want to say and then speak them aloud, researchers report in the Jan. 31 issue of the journal Nature. Specifically, the map shows how speech sounds like consonants and vowels are represented in the brain well before they are spoken, and how the brain strings them together during language production. “Although speaking usually seems easy, our brains perform many complex cognitive steps in the production of natural speech — including coming up with the words we want to say, planning the articulatory movements and producing our intended vocalizations,” said senior study author Dr. Ziv Williams, an associate professor in neurosurgery at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. “Our brains perform these feats surprisingly fast — about three words per second in natural speech — with remarkably few errors,” Williams added in a hospital news release. “Yet, how we precisely achieve this feat has remained a mystery.” The findings could form the basis of sophisticated brain-machine interfaces capable of producing synthetic speech, the researchers said. They also could provide insight into a wide array of disorders that hamper or prevent speech. “Disruptions in the speech and language networks are observed in a wide variety of neurological…  read on >  read on >

Women with a common ovarian disorder might be more likely to have memory and thinking problems in middle age, a new study suggests. Females diagnosed with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) scored lower on cognitive tests than women without the condition, according to a report published Jan. 31 in the journal Neurology. The condition specifically appeared to affect memory, attention and verbal abilities, researchers said. “Polycystic ovary syndrome is a common reproductive disorder that impacts up to 10% of women,” said researcher Dr. Heather Huddleston, director of the PCOS Clinic at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). “Our results suggest that people with this condition have lower memory and thinking skills and subtle brain changes at midlife,” Huddleston said in a UCSF news release. “This could impact a person on many levels, including quality of life, career success and financial security.” Polycystic ovary syndrome is a hormonal disorder in which the ovaries produce an abnormally high amount of androgens, which are male sex hormones. The condition causes irregular menstruation, as well as excess body hair, weight gain, acne, infertility and thinning hair. Some women with PCOS wind up with ovarian cysts, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine. For the study, researchers tracked more than 900 women between the ages of 18 and 30 for three decades, at which time they completed a series of cognitive tests.…  read on >  read on >