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Tag: NIH
12/01/2022

UAMS Researchers Design App to Prevent Opioid Use Disorder Relapse

Article Excerpt: A trio of researchers at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) have designed a smart phone application to decrease opioid cravings and optimize medication-assisted treatment among individuals with opioid use disorder. A prototype of the app, known as OptiMAT (Optimizing Medication Assisted Treatment), was one of five winning entries in the 2022 National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) “Product Prototypes to Combat Drug Craving” Challenge, a national contest of product prototypes designed to reduce drug cravings and prevent drug misuse, earning Andrew James, Ph.D., Ronald G. Thompson, Ph.D., and Mary Bollinger, Ph.D., an honorable mention and a $5,000 cash prize.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/yc7jrp5h

Article Source: UAMS News

11/10/2022

Digital Therapeutics Summit Held at Dartmouth

Article Excerpt: Nearly 175 people representing the digital health and pharmaceutical industries, health care systems, clinicians, scientists, investors, Dartmouth students and faculty, and government officials representing the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gathered on Dartmouth’s campus November 2 for daylong discussions centered on digital therapeutics. Hosted by Geisel School of Medicine’s Center for Technology and Behavioral Health (CTBH) and Dartmouth’s Magnuson Center for Entrepreneurship, the program provided an overview of the science and clinical practice of digital therapeutics, the current and anticipated paths to their global deployment, and a vision for the future. This is the first time these groups have come together in conversations hosted by an academic institution about the digital health landscape and may well be viewed as a seminal moment in the rapidly developing field.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/2fnhbyxa

Article Source: Dartmouth Geisel School of Medicine News

11/08/2022

Clinical Trial to Assess Efficacy of Virtual Alcohol Use Disorder Treatment

Article Excerpt: Over the last 10 years, alcohol use disorder (AUD) has been a significant driver of the drop in life expectancy in the US, with 28.3 million people suffering from the disease in 2020, according to the press release. Among those 26 years and older, the frequency of AUD doubled between 2017 and 2020, rising from 10.6 million to 22.4 million. To help address and treat these conditions, Ria Health announced a partnership with Stanford University at The Liver Meeting to launch a clinical trial using funding from the NIH. In the trial, researchers will examine whether the Ria Health Program can limit problematic drinking and markers related to liver disease. Hosted by the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, The Liver Meeting is the leading national conference for hepatology.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/53ds73s6

Article Source: mHealth Intelligence

11/07/2022

Weill Cornell Medicine Awarded NIH Grant to Address Opioid Health Crisis

Article Excerpt: Weill Cornell Medicine has been awarded a five-year, $8.1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support economic analysis, simulation modeling and other research approaches to help stem the national opioid epidemic. “We’ve continued to witness the very disturbing increase in opioid overdoses over the last seven years, fueled by more fentanyl in the drug supply,” said principal investigator Dr. Bruce Schackman, the Saul P. Steinberg Distinguished Professor of Population Health Sciences and director of the Center for Health Economics of Treatment Interventions for Substance Use Disorder, HCB, and HIV (CHERISH) at Weill Cornell Medicine. “Opioid overdoses are now the highest they’ve ever been. That’s been a big driver of a greater national focus on treatment and interventions to reduce overdoses.”

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/4px27edj

Article Source: Weill Cornell Medicine News

04/07/2022

Science Update: Digital Tool to Increase Youth HIV Testing Shows Promise in NIH-Funded Study

Article Excerpt: Youth aged 13 to 24 years who were offered HIV testing by a digital health tool on a tablet computer were as likely to accept as those who were offered testing face-to-face, according to a study funded by the National Institutes of Health. However, among study participants aged 19 and younger who previously declined HIV testing, those who used the digital tool were 1.7 times more likely to agree to an HIV test, compared to those who received a face-to-face offer. Findings from the study, which was conducted in a New York City hospital emergency department, appear in Cureus. The Mobile Augmented Screening tool, or MAS, was developed and evaluated with funding from NIH’s Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Ian David Aronson, Ph.D., of Digital Health Empowerment and New York University, led the work.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/67nnmsu7

Article Source: NICHD

09/21/2021

Tulane Scientists Develop ‘Living Nerve Circuit’ to Fight Opioid Epidemic

Article Excerpt: In 2019, nearly 50,000 people in the United States died from opioid overdoses, bringing the total of number of deaths from the opioid crisis to half a million over the past 10 years, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. Michael J. Moore, a professor of biomedical engineering at Tulane University School of Science and Engineering, is part of a national study that aims to turn those statistics around by creating a living bioengineered nerve circuit that mimics the pain transmission pathway in the spinal cord. The circuit of living cells, which is designed to help scientists test the effectiveness of non-addictive alternatives to opioid painkillers, is highlighted in the prestigious journal Science Advances.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/2aknt2ad

Article Source: Biz New Orleans

08/23/2021

Geisel’s Center for Technology and Behavioral Health $7.1M Grant to Expand Work in Digital Therapeutics

Article Excerpt: The Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth’s Center for Technology and Behavioral Health (CTBH) has received a five-year renewal grant of more than $7.1 million from The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), an institute under the National Institutes of Health dedicated to supporting scientific research on drug use and its consequences. “I’m very excited for Dr. Marsch and her colleagues in the Center for Technology and Behavioral Health to receive this renewed support to pursue improvements to treating substance use disorders,” says Geisel’s dean Duane A. Compton, PhD. “The digital tools developed by CTBH, and its collaborative partners, provide ongoing innovative approaches to help individuals in need manage their disorder.”

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/e7kxk9ws

Article Source: Geisel School of Medicine News

08/11/2021

A Yale Doctor Is Using a Video Game to Fight the Opioid Crisis

Article Excerpt: As drug-related deaths have spiked across the United States in recent years, doctors seeking to curb that surge are getting an unlikely new tool: a video game. The game, titled “PlaySmart,” was developed by Lynn Fiellin and funded in part by the National Institutes of Health. A professor at the Yale School of Medicine and Yale Child Study Center, as well as the founder and director of the play2PREVENT video game development lab, Fiellin hopes that by using “PlaySmart,” she and her team will be able to collect more data related to adolescent opioid misuse and provide aid to both kids who play the game and the adults who work those youths.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/jt4k5r8b

Article Source: The Washington Post

08/03/2021

Digital Therapeutics for Substance Use Disorders: From Research to Practice

Article Excerpt: Over the last decade, and especially since the COVID-19 pandemic began, technology has been leveraged more than ever in medicine. The umbrella term “digital health” encompasses digital medicine (DM) and refers to all entities that engage lay individuals in wellness and health-related endeavors by collecting data.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/wvhzavxh

Article Source: Psychiatric Times