Prolactin (PRL) data from adolescents treated with olanzapine are presented.

Data from 454 adolescents (13-18, mean=15.9 yrs) with schizophrenia or bipolar mania were pooled from 4 olanzapine (2.5-20.0mg/day) studies (4-32 weeks; 2 double-blind, placebo-controlled studies [combined for acute phase endpoint PRL levels] with open-label extensions; 2 open-label studies). Age- and sex-specific Covance reference ranges defined normal PRL; categorical increases were based on multiples of the upper limit of normal (ULN). Baseline-to-endpoint PRL changes in adolescents were compared with data pooled from 84 olanzapine clinical trials in adults with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.

Olanzapine-treated adolescents had mean PRL increases at both the acute (11.4μg/L) and open-label endpoints (4.7μg/L). Of those patients with normal PRL levels at baseline (N=311), high PRL occurred in 54.7% at anytime; 32.2% at endpoint. The percentage of patients in which PRL levels shifted from normal-to-abnormal was smaller at endpoint than at anytime during treatment; 26.7% shifted to a higher category. Among patients with normal baseline PRL, 32.7% remained <=1X ULN; 32.3% increased to 1¬<=2X; 6.0%, >2-<=3X; and 1.2%, >3X at anytime; 4.6% had at >=1 potentially PRL-related adverse event. Adolescents had significantly higher mean changes at endpoint (p=.004), and a greater incidence of high PRL levels at anytime during olanzapine treatment (p<.001) versus adults.

Incidence of high PRL was significantly higher, and mean increases in PRL were significantly greater in adolescents versus adults. Mean increases and high PRL incidence were lower at the open-label compared with the acute phase endpoint.

The changes in metabolic parameters in olanzapine-treated adolescents were examined.

Data from 454 adolescents (13–18, mean=15.9 years) with schizophrenia or bipolar I disorder were pooled from 4 olanzapine (2.5–20.0mg/day) studies (4–32 weeks). Changes in metabolic parameters in adolescents were compared with those of olanzapine-treated adults (pooled from 84 clinical trials); changes in weight and BMI were compared with US age- and sex-adjusted standardized growth curves.

Olanzapine-treated adolescents had significant increases from baseline-to-endpoint in fasting glucose (p=.021); total cholesterol, LDL, and triglycerides (p<.001); and significant decreases in HDL (p<.001). Significantly more adolescents gained >=7% of their baseline weight versus adults (65.1% vs. 35.6%, p<.001); mean change from baseline-to-endpoint in weight was significantly greater in adolescents (7.0 vs. 3.3kg, p<.001). Adolescents had significantly lower mean changes from baseline-to-endpoint in fasting glucose (0.3 vs. 0.1mmol/L, p=.002) and triglycerides (0.3 vs. 0.2mmol/L, p=.007) versus adults. Significantly more adults experienced treatment-emergent normal-to-high changes at anytime in fasting glucose (4.8% vs. 1.2%, p=.033), total cholesterol (6.9% vs. 1.1%, p=.001), LDL (5.8% vs. 1.5%, p=.014), and triglycerides (25.7% vs. 17.4%, p=.030). Compared with standardized growth curves, olanzapine-treated adolescents had greater increases from baseline-to-endpoint in weight (1.0 vs. 7.1kg, p<.001), height (0.5 vs. 0.7cm, p<.001), and BMI (0.2 vs. 2.2kg/m2, p<.001).

Olanzapine-treated adolescents may gain significantly more weight compared with adults, but may have smaller changes in other metabolic parameters. Clinicians may want to consider both efficacy and changes in metabolic parameters when selecting treatment options for individual adolescent patients.

Identifying youth who may engage in future substance use could facilitate early identification of substance use disorder vulnerability. We aimed to identify biomarkers that predicted future substance use in psychiatrically un-well youth.

LASSO regression for variable selection was used to predict substance use 24.3 months after neuroimaging assessment in 73 behaviorally and emotionally dysregulated youth aged 13.9 (s.d. = 2.0) years, 30 female, from three clinical sites in the Longitudinal Assessment of Manic Symptoms (LAMS) study. Predictor variables included neural activity during a reward task, cortical thickness, and clinical and demographic variables.

Future substance use was associated with higher left middle prefrontal cortex activity, lower left ventral anterior insula activity, thicker caudal anterior cingulate cortex, higher depression and lower mania scores, not using antipsychotic medication, more parental stress, older age. This combination of variables explained 60.4% of the variance in future substance use, and accurately classified 83.6%.

These variables explained a large proportion of the variance, were useful classifiers of future substance use, and showed the value of combining multiple domains to provide a comprehensive understanding of substance use development. This may be a step toward identifying neural measures that can identify future substance use disorder risk, and act as targets for therapeutic interventions.

Neuroimaging measures of behavioral and emotional dysregulation can yield biomarkers denoting developmental trajectories of psychiatric pathology in youth. We aimed to identify functional abnormalities in emotion regulation (ER) neural circuitry associated with different behavioral and emotional dysregulation trajectories using latent class growth analysis (LCGA) and neuroimaging.

A total of 61 youth (9–17 years) from the Longitudinal Assessment of Manic Symptoms study, and 24 healthy control youth, completed an emotional face n-back ER task during scanning. LCGA was performed on 12 biannual reports completed over 5 years of the Parent General Behavior Inventory 10-Item Mania Scale (PGBI-10M), a parental report of the child's difficulty regulating positive mood and energy.

There were two latent classes of PGBI-10M trajectories: high and decreasing (HighD; n = 22) and low and decreasing (LowD; n = 39) course of behavioral and emotional dysregulation over the 12 time points. Task performance was >89% in all youth, but more accurate in healthy controls and LowD versus HighD (p < 0.001). During ER, LowD had greater activity than HighD and healthy controls in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, a key ER region, and greater functional connectivity than HighD between the amygdala and ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (p's < 0.001, corrected).

Patterns of function in lateral prefrontal cortical–amygdala circuitry in youth denote the severity of the developmental trajectory of behavioral and emotional dysregulation over time, and may be biological targets to guide differential treatment and novel treatment development for different levels of behavioral and emotional dysregulation in youth.