TopAbstracts in Addictions
Index at Doctor's Guide of "the abstracts most highly rated/most read by nearly 300,000 physicians who received a Doctor's Guide newsletter or visited a website powered by Doctor's Guide in the past 14 days. Over 2000 peer-reviewed journals are covered by TopAbstracts."  
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Brief Psychotherapies for Depression: Current Status
Article in Current Opinion in Psychiatry at Medscape - "Treatment trials suggest that brief therapies can be effective for individuals from different ethnic and patient sub-populations. There is limited evidence on cost-effectiveness of brief therapies and the data on the benefits for different modes of therapy delivery suggest there are still a number of issues to address in this area. Work on mediators and moderators is in its infancy, but there is a number of factors, such as therapeutic alliance, certain personality traits and the notion of sudden therapeutic gain that appear to be important predictors of outcome across all brief therapies for depression." [Viewing Medscape resources requires registration, which is free].  
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Co-existing alcohol-use and psychiatric disorders - Promising new treatment
Story in Medical News Today (UK) - "Individuals who have co-existing alcohol-use and psychiatric disorders must overcome a number of significant hurdles on their way to recovery: multiple health and social problems, double the stigma, a poor response to traditional treatments, a lack of joint treatment options, and a chronic cycle of treatment entry and re-entry. Symposium proceedings published in the February issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research examine treatment options for this group, with a focus on four major psychiatric disorders: social anxiety disorder, depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia."  
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U.S. Nears Clash With Governors on Medicaid Cost
Front page New York Times story - "The Bush administration is headed for a confrontation with states over the financing of Medicaid, the nation's largest health program, as federal officials crack down on arrangements used by many states to shift costs to the federal government. The federal action comes as states, struggling with severe fiscal problems, are cutting benefits and restricting eligibility for the program, which serves 50 million low-income people each year. Federal officials and auditors contend that states use creative bookkeeping and other ploys to obtain large amounts of federal Medicaid money without paying their share. Washington and the states split Medicaid costs, with the federal government paying 50 percent and sometimes more than 70 percent. But in many cases, the Bush administration says, states have paid their share with 'phantom dollars,' instead of state or local tax revenues." [Viewing New York Times resources requires registration, which is free].  
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Major changes ahead in mental-health care (Montana)
Story at the Daily Inter Lake - "For years, mental health consumer advocates have urged consumer involvement in managing the Medicaid dollars that control their lives. On Wednesday in Kalispell, state officials, service providers and consumers of mental health services met to begin to figure out how to make the idea work. Passed by the Legislature, SB347 jump-started a bureaucratic overhaul. The renovation aims to make department officials, consumers and providers partners in dividing up and managing limited money for mental health services..."  
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