Events of Interest

The Woo-Woo: How I Survived Ice Hockey, Drug Raids, Demons, and my Crazy Chinese Family

Lindsay Wong

Lucid Book Club & Reading Series

September 18, 2019

Lindsay Wong reads from The Woo-Woo. In this jaw-dropping, darkly comedic memoir, a young woman comes of age in a dysfunctional Asian family who blame their woes on ghosts and demons when they should really be on anti-psychotic meds.

Lindsay Wong grew up with a grandmother who has paranoid schizophrenia and a mother who was deeply afraid of the “woo-woo” — Chinese ghosts who come to visit in times of personal turmoil. From a young age, she witnessed the woo-woo’s sinister effects; when she was six, Lindsay and her mother avoided the dead people haunting their house by hiding out in a mall food court, and on a camping trip, in an effort to rid her daughter of demons, her mother tried to light Lindsay’s foot on fire.  [more]

The Benefits and Risks of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder Medication

Dr Brian D’Onofrio

CARMHA Research Seminar

July 25, 2019

Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) suggest that attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) medication has beneficial short-term effects on symptoms of ADHD, and some co-occurring disorders. RCTs of ADHD medication have serious limitations, however, including the inability to generalize to individuals with serious comorbid problems, study rare-but-serious outcomes, and adequately examine long-term outcomes. Therefore, there is a critical need to more precisely identify the specific benefits and risks of ADHD medication, particularly with samples and designs that can explore rare outcomes. The presentation will provide examples of how the analyses of large-scale health insurance claims datasets in the United States and national registry data (e.g., in Sweden) can help specify the benefits and risks of ADHD medication when using advanced research designs. In particular, the presentation will describe how the use of within-individual comparisons can help elucidate the associations between ADHD medication and numerous outcomes. [more]