•Methylphenidate, a nervous system stimulant, is the active ingredient in the brand-name medication Ritalin.•The non-medical consumption of this drug is on the rise worldwide, particularly among ...medical students who belong to an at-risk group.•Depression is a significant side effect of Ritalin.•However, the severity of this adverse effect is usually not severe, as per the study.•Hence, it is recommended that additional research be conducted on the indiscriminate use of Ritalin in students and ways to manage and prevent its side effects.
Methylphenidate, a nervous system stimulant, is the active ingredient in the brand-name medication Ritalin. The non-medical consumption of this drug is on the rise worldwide, particularly among medical students who belong to an at-risk group. However, misusing this drug can have adverse effects such as depression. In this study, we sought to evaluate the relationship between arbitrary use of Ritalin and the incidence of depression and explore associated factors.
In this descriptive cross-sectional study, we examined 100 medical students enrolled at (XXX) Medical School (XXX) who reported taking at least one dose of Ritalin in the past month. We gathered participant data, including demographics such as age, education, residence status, history of psychiatric illness, and history of psychiatric medication use. Additionally, we collected information related to depression and anxiety using a questionnaire design based on the Hamilton scoring system in which a score range of 10–13 indicates mild depression, a score range of 14–17 signifies mild to moderate depression, and a score exceeding 17 indicates moderate to severe depression.
Several noteworthy findings emerged from our study. We observed that the average age of female (26.45 ± 4.55, n = 39) participants was significantly higher than that of their male (24.26 ± 3.71, n = 61) counterparts (p = 0.01). Moreover, the average final depression score for students was determined to be 18.19, with a median score of 16. The data analysis revealed that 45% of students exhibited moderate to severe depression, whereas 55% experienced either no depression or only mild symptoms.
Our study indicates that depression is indeed a significant side effect of Ritalin use among medical students.
A recent study has claimed that the global rate of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is 5.29%. Any variation in such rates in specific studies, argue the authors, was due to ...methodological problems, rather than differences in the actual distribution of ADHD. Such reports strengthen the flawed notion that ADHD is a universal and essential disorder, found in all human populations across time and place. While it is true that the concept of ADHD has spread from the USA, where it emerged during the late 1950s, to most corners of the globe, such superficial pronouncements mask profound differences in how ADHD has been interpreted in different countries and regions. In this paper, I compare ADHD's emergence in Canada, the UK, Scandinavia, China and India, arguing that, while ADHD can be considered a global phenomenon, behavioural and educational imperfections remain very much a product of local historical, cultural and political factors.
•MPD elicits sensitization in some animals and tolerance in others.•Sensitization and tolerance are experimental biomarkers indicating a drug of abuse.•PFC and CN neuronal firing rates increased in ...sensitized animals.•PFC and CN neuronal firing rates decreased in tolerant animals.•Dose-response differences between the PFC and CN were observed.
Methylphenidate (MPD) is commonly used to treat attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Recently, it is being abused for cognitive enhancement and recreation leading to concerns regarding its addictive potential. The prefrontal cortex (PFC) and caudate nucleus (CN) are two of the brain structures involved in the motive/reward circuit most affected by MPD and are also thought to be responsible for ADHD phenomena. This study is unique in that it investigated acute and chronic, dose-response MPD exposure on animals’ behavior activity concomitantly with PFC and CN neuronal circuitry in freely behaving adult animals without the interference of anesthesia. Further, it compared acute and chronic MPD action on over 1,000 subcortical and cortical neurons simultaneously, allowing for a more accurate interpretation of drug action on corticostriatal neuronal circuitry. For this experiment, four groups of animals were used: saline (control), 0.6, 2.5, and 10.0 mg/kg MPD following acute and repetitive exposure. The data shows that the same MPD dose elicits behavioral sensitization in some animals and tolerance in others and that the PFC and CN neuronal activity correlates with the animals' behavioral responses to MPD. The expression of sensitization and tolerance are experimental biomarkers indicating that a drug has addictive potential. In general, a greater percentage of CN units responded to both acute and chronic MPD exposure as compared to PFC units. Dose response differences between the PFC and the CN units were observed. The dichotomy that some PFC and CN units responded to the same MPD dose by excitation and other units by attenuation in neuronal firing rate is discussed. In conclusion, to understand the mechanism of action of the drug, it is essential to study, simultaneously, on more than one brain site, the electrophysiological and behavioral effects of acute and chronic drug exposure, as sensitization and tolerance are experimental biomarkers indicating that a drug has addictive potential. The behavioral and neuronal data obtained from this study indicates that chronic MPD exposure results in behavioral and biochemical changes consistent with a substance abuse disorder.
Ritalin as a causal perturbation Hacker, Catrina M.; Rust, Nicole C.
Trends in cognitive sciences,
July 2022, 2022-Jul, 2022-07-00, 20220701, Volume:
26, Issue:
7
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
Causal perturbations provide the strongest tests of the relationships between brain mechanism and brain function. In cognitive neuroscience, persuasive causal perturbations are difficult to achieve. ...In a recent paper, Ni et al. cleverly use the neuropsychiatric drug methylphenidate (Ritalin) to causally test the brain mechanisms that support goal-directed attention.
High-risk behaviours, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, substance use, and pre/extramarital sex are considered major public health issues. The present study aimed to estimate the prevalence rate ...of high-risk behaviours among medical students in the North-West of Iran. This study recruited 500 medical students of the Tabriz University of Medical Science. Data collection was performed by using the self-administered tool of the Youth Risk Behaviour Surveillance System (YRBSS). Data analysis was done with the SPSS software version 16 by using the chi-squared test and logistic regression. The mean (standard deviation) of age for participants was 23.85 (2.36) years. The prevalence rates of cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, and pre/extramarital sexual contact were 18.88%, 11.62%, and 14.43%, respectively. The prevalence rates for use of substances and non-prescribed Ritalin were 9.22% and 16.03%, respectively. The current use was documented in 3.22% for substances and 4.02% for Ritalin. The prevalence rate of at least one of the five high-risk behaviours in the previous month was 25.00%. Males and students living alone were significantly more likely to conduct high-risk behaviours. Peer pressure was the most common motivator for these risky practices. About one-fourth of the students engaged in at least one of the high-risk behaviours in the previous 30 days, which is relatively high for medical students. Therefore, the student counselling centers should implement screening programs especially for males and students who live alone, to provide appropriate behavioural interventional programs for harm reduction. Timely attitude improvement programs are highly recommended from a younger age.
•Nongenetic, paternal effects can occur through sperm or interactions with females.•Our treatments affected male mating behaviour and female preference for those males.•Manipulating mate ...attractiveness increased offspring aversion to a novel object.•Exposing males to Ritalin disrupted the father-offspring behavioural association.•Male mating behaviour can affect offspring behaviour through multiple mechanisms.
Evidence is emerging that fathers can have nongenetic effects on the phenotypes of their offspring. Most studies have focused on the role that nongenetic modifications to sperm can have on offspring phenotype; however, fathers can also have nongenetic effects on offspring through their interactions with females, called female-mediated paternal effects. These effects can occur in situations where male phenotype, e.g. behaviour or morphology, affects female stress and/or provisioning of offspring. These effects are potentially widespread, but few studies have explicitly investigated the role of female-mediated paternal effects on offspring phenotype. Here, we asked if male mating interactions can affect offspring via female mediated paternal effects in the Trinidadian guppy, Poecilia reticulata. To do this, we manipulated mating behaviour by: (i) administering a drug known to affect the neurotransmitter dopamine, and (ii) varying the familiarity of potential mates, which affects attractiveness in this species. With these treatments, we successfully manipulated the mating behaviour of male guppies and female preference for those males. Further, we found significant effects of sire mating behaviour, sire drug treatment, and parental familiarity status on behavioural measures of offspring anxiety in response to a novel object. Because Control offspring of ‘familiar’ and ‘unfamiliar’ pairs differed in their behaviour, our results cannot be solely attributed to potential nongenetic modifications to sperm caused by the drug. These results emphasize the importance of female-mediated paternal effects, including those caused by altered male mating behaviour, in shaping offspring phenotype.
•MPH and METH effects on anxiety in females have not been previously studied.•Acute and chronic dosing was used to determine changes in anxiety during the EPM.•MPH, given acute or chronic, decreased ...anxiety in adult female rats.•METH and MPH altered locomotion during an open field test, but not during the EPM.•Adult female rats given MPH show evidence of an anxiolytic effect.
Methylphenidate (MPH) and methamphetamine (METH) are two commonly abused psychomotor stimulants that impact anxiety, but in a manner that is currently unclear. This study adds to the literature by testing the effects of MPH and METH on anxiety in adult female rats, which has not previously been studied. In Experiment1, changes in anxiety-like behavior were determined using the Elevated Plus Maze (EPM) following either an acute injection of saline, METH (1 mg/kg), or MPH (10 mg/kg). Changes in general locomotion were measured using the open field test. MPH, but not METH, significantly decreased anxiety; MPH and METH were associated with increased activity in the open field. In Experiment2, we compared the effects of three once daily injections of saline to MPH (10 mg/kg) or METH (1 mg/kg). As with the acute dosing, repeated exposure to MPH, but not METH, decreased anxiety, and both drugs increased locomotion. Neither acute nor chronic dosing produced a change in locomotion during the EPM, indicating that the anxiolytic effects of MPH are independent of changes in locomotor behavior. These findings add further clarification to the literature investigating the psychoactive properties of MPH, with a special and needed emphasis on female behavior.
Matched combinations of Brønsted or Lewis acids with suitable pro-electrophiles and secondary amine organocatalysts enable the novel enantioselective syntheses of carbamoyl dihydroquinoline and ...tetrahydropyridine derivatives with concomitant formation of two stereocenters. A short formal asymmetric synthesis of (2R,2'R)-threo-methylphenidate (Ritalin) is also described.
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