Background/Objectives: Chemsex is defined as the intentional use of psychoactive substances to enhance or prolong sexual activity, predominantly observed among men who have sex with men. It has emerged as a notable behavioral and public health concern due to its association with high-risk sexual practices, psychiatric morbidity, and somatic complications. Despite increasing recognition, global...
Abstract Self-transcendence, the reorientation of experience away from the self toward others, nature, or broader meaning, is a fundamental dimension of human psychology, yet its causal neural architecture remains poorly understood. Here we applied lesion network mapping to 88 neurosurgical patients with pre- and post-operative assessments of trait self-transcendence to identify the distributed...
Major depressive disorder is a highly prevalent psychiatric condition that can affect individuals across the lifespan, yet its pathophysiology remains incompletely understood. Classical hypotheses, informed by preclinical and clinical studies, emphasized dysregulated monoaminergic neurotransmission and guided the development of widely prescribed antidepressants, including selective serotonin...
INTRODUCTION: After decades of regulatory marginalization, psychedelic compounds have reemerged as promising therapeutic tools in psychiatry, driven by unmet clinical needs in treatment-resistant mental disorders and by growing evidence of rapid and sustained effects on mood, cognition, and behavior. AREAS COVERED: This narrative review critically examined the current clinical and regulatory...
Neurology BulletinMarch 23, 2026Azat R. Asadullin, Elvina A. Akhmetova, Ilia S. Efremov et al.
BACKGROUND: Substance use disorders remain a global public health problem. In recent decades, the drug market has undergone substantial changes, with traditional drugs increasingly replaced by new psychoactive substances characterized by high toxicity and strong addictive potential. Their distribution via the Internet and social media impedes control and increases risks to public health. AIM:...
Abstract Serotonergic psychedelics have attracted considerable interest as promising therapeutic agents. However, the molecular mechanisms linking their acute hallucinogenic-like effects to longer-lasting neuroplastic responses remain incompletely understood, partly because of the scarcity of native neural models suitable for mechanistic studies. Here, we developed a neural stem cell-derived in...
The Journal of ECTMarch 19, 2026Jennifer Sjödin, Karin Zimmer, Max Bell et al.
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is an established treatment of major depressive disorder (MDD), particularly in severe cases and in cases resistant to pharmacological interventions. Anesthesia plays an important role in optimizing patient tolerability during ECT but may attenuate the treatment effect, as anesthetic agents elevate the seizure threshold. This review aims to examine the impact of...
Hypochondriacal obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) combines intrusive health anxieties with compulsive reassurance seeking and often resists high-dose selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and cognitive-behavioural therapy. Interest has shifted toward glutamatergic agents that mimic ketamine's rapid synaptic effects. A 34-year-old woman endured two years of recurrent fear of serious...
psychiatric disorders, beta-carbolines, trace amine, phosphoproteomics, social hierarchy. Scientific interest in psychedelic substances has re-emerged, offering new perspectives on the treatment of neuropsychiatric and neurological disorders.Historically, psychedelics have been associated with a wide spectrum of positive and negative effects, encompassing ritualistic and spiritual use,...
Treatment-resistant depression (TRD) is a severe form of major depressive disorder in which patients do not achieve remission despite multiple adequate treatment trials. Evidence across pharmacologic options for TRD remains limited, and trials often do not fully capture patient-reported tolerability. Large-scale online peer-support narratives therefore offer a complementary lens on how patients...