We report a 63-year-old male with post-cerebral hemorrhage depressive disorder. Previous adequate-dose, full-course antidepressant treatment yielded no significant improvement in depression, anxiety, or sleep disturbance. Detailed history taking and polysomnography (PSG) confirmed comorbid severe obstructive sleep apnea hypopnea syndrome (OSAHS) and rapid eye movement sleep behavior disorder (RBD). Without adjusting antidepressants, the patient first received continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) for OSAHS, followed by individualized pharmacotherapy for RBD. With the improvement of sleep architecture and respiratory events, obvious remission of depressive and anxiety symptoms and substantial recovery of daytime function were observed. This case emphasizes the bidirectional relationship between sleep and mood disorders. For post-stroke depression (PSD) poorly responsive to antidepressants, active sleep evaluation, multidisciplinary collaboration, and targeted management of comorbid sleep disorders may be crucial to enhance therapeutic efficacy.
Claude Science is Anthropic’s newest flagship product
At an event for pharmaceutical executives, biotech founders, and researchers on Tuesday, Anthropic announced Claude Science, a major new product intended to support scientific research in the same way that Claude Code supports software engineering. Like Claude Code, Claude Science can autonomously carry out meaningful work when given concise, high-level instructions, and it has access to tools that make it particularly useful for research in computational biology and drug development. Along with launching and previewing Claude Science, which is now available to all paid Claude subscribers, Anthropic also announced that it will be using the product to pursue some of its own research into drugs for rare, neglected diseases.
This is not Anthropic’s first foray into AI for science. In October, the company released plug-ins that help Claude make use of scientific software and databases under the heading “Claude for Life Sciences.” But unlike this earlier release, Claude Science is a full-featured, standalone product. Anthropic’s decision to elevate Claude Science to the same rank as Claude Code and Claude Cowork indicates that the company is taking AI’s scientific applications very seriously—or at least wants to give the impression that it is.
“It represents how important this is to our mission that this is right up there with Claude Code and Claude Cowork as the next really significant product that we’re releasing,” says Eric Kauderer-Abrams, Anthropic’s head of life sciences. “Our mission is to develop AI that serves humanity’s long-term well-being, and we believe that by far the greatest opportunity to do that is in the life sciences.”
For the past decade, one company—Google DeepMind—has been at the vanguard of AI for science. CEO Demis Hassabis and researcher John Jumper won the Nobel Prize in chemistry for their work on the company’s AlphaFold model, and DeepMind has also made major contributions to meteorology, materials science, and a variety of other disciplines. But in the past several months, the fast-advancing frontier of AI progress seems to have left DeepMind in the dust. When it comes to coding, which has become the most lucrative use case for LLMs, DeepMind is stuck playing catch-up.
Anthropic is well positioned to take up DeepMind’s scientific mantle. Like Hassabis, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei is a PhD scientist—unlike OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who’s a businessman through and through. Many scientists are already avid users of tools such as Claude Code. These days, a lot of scientific research involves some amount of coding, but not all scientists are expert software engineers, and so tools like Claude Code can make a huge difference for their productivity. And the company has recently earned a major scientific vote of confidence: Earlier this month, Jumper announced that he is leaving DeepMind for Anthropic.
Since agents powered by LLMs, including Anthropic’s Opus model series, became capable of useful, independent work in late 2025, scientists have been seeing just how much they can do. In a blog post published on Anthropic’s website, the Harvard physicist Matthew Schwartz estimated, on the basis of his work with Claude Code and other Anthropic tools, that the company’s Opus 4.5 model is about as capable of executing scientific projects as a second-year graduate student.
According to Kauderer-Abrams, Claude Science isn’t intended to displace Claude Code and Claude Cowork in scientists’ workflows. Instead, it’s designed to build on what scientists already find useful about Anthropic’s products. For instance, it not only writes code but also helps scientists run their code on powerful computer clusters, which many many scientists need for their work but can be difficult to manage. And it prioritizes reproducibility, so that scientists can trace back the source of any figure or result and check it for accuracy and validity.
Though Claude Science could in principle assist with any area of scientific research, it seems designed and marketed as a tool for molecular and cellular biology, and for drug development in particular. It can interface with various tools used in genetics, chemistry, and protein biology, all of which could come in handy for researchers on the hunt for new drugs. During the Tuesday event, Alexander Tarashansky, who led the development of Claude Science, demonstrated how the system could autonomously identify new drug candidates for phenylketonuria, a rare genetic disease.
And Anthropic isn’t leaving all that work to the pharma companies and university labs that were represented at the event. Armed with Claude Science, it will be pursuing its own research into drug candidates for neglected diseases—both to help move science forward and to gain a clearer sense of how Claude Science works in the real world.
There are obvious humanitarian reasons to prioritize drug development when creating a general-purpose scientific research tool, and AI industry leaders often cite curing disease as a major potential upside of the technology. But it’s also notable that pharmaceutical companies have far deeper pockets than academic researchers. Anthropic says it’s set to see its first profitable quarter, and if major new contracts with pharmaceutical companies are forthcoming, they could help ensure it stays profitable as the tokenmaxxing craze dies down—something that’s ever more important as an IPO approaches later this year.
Expedited Transition to Digital Delivery of Recovery Support Services Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic: Mixed Methods Needs Assessment
Background: Recovery support services (RSS) are an evidence-based approach to support recovery from substance use disorders, most often composed of peer-to-peer support, referrals to housing, job training, and other forms of prosocial engagement and activities. During the COVID-19 pandemic, RSS providers quickly converted in-person services to digital delivery to avoid disruption. It is unclear if this rapid conversion impacted the delivery of services or if this delivery model could enhance RSS reach and uptake more generally by extending the reach of RSS providers and offering an alternative delivery method and access point. Objective: The goal of this study was to identify how RSS providers in Texas adapted their services for digital delivery and to what extent, if at all, technology limitations (eg, lack of digital infrastructure) were present. Methods: We conducted an electronic survey of 85 RSS providers, assessing their current capacity and methods for the digital recovery support service (D-RSS), followed by semistructured online interviews with a subset of 20 respondents. Results: Most survey respondents (74/85, 87.1%) used D-RSS, though they used many dated technologies, devices, and platforms for service delivery. Many respondents indicated that they use Zoom (Zoom Video Communications) videoconferencing to communicate with participants; however, providers also indicated that they must use several different technology platforms to accomplish their service delivery goals. Four main themes emerged from the interviews: (1) the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on RSS, (2) barriers and facilitators to technology-delivered D-RSS, (3) awareness and expectations regarding the use of D-RSS, and (4) training needs to deliver D-RSS. Conclusions: RSS organizations have access to technology for D-RSS; however, the technology is often outdated. Because the pandemic required a rapid and unexpected shift to D-RSS to maintain and potentially expand access during a public health emergency, providers desire guidance for training staff and participants on how to best use technology. A subset of providers endorsed the potential of a unified platform for D-RSS delivery, especially for data capture. Most barriers to D-RSS identified by our respondents may be addressable through the streamlined deployment of technology resources, rigorous training and onboarding programs in best practices for providers and participants, and tailored implementation strategies for varying local contexts.
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Knowledge Graphs Based on Meta-Analysis Papers Improve the Quality of Case Formulation: Mixed Methods Design
Background: Case formulation (CF) is a core skill for therapists; however, creating high-quality CFs requires considerable time. Objective: This study aims to demonstrate that providing a knowledge graph based on meta-analytic literature can enhance CF quality. Methods: Five groups were established, including 4 large language model groups and 1 human expert group, each generating 25 CFs based on 25 vignettes. The control group with Claude (Sonnet 3.7; Anthropic) produced 25 CFs. The personalization group served as the control group with additional personalization prompts. The knowledge graph group used a large language model that generated 25 CFs, which was provided with a meta-analysis knowledge graph. Further incorporation of additional personalization prompts then comprised the knowledge graph with personalization group. Finally, the expert group consisted of 25 CFs generated by a human expert. These 125 CFs in total were evaluated for general quality (ie, correctness, completeness, feasibility, and consistency) using a 7-point scale and 18 essential elements with binary scores (0 or 1) by another human expert. The CFs were also qualitatively analyzed. Results: The knowledge graph and knowledge graph with personalization groups scored significantly higher than the control group in terms of correctness, completeness, and feasibility. The expert group scored significantly higher on consistency than the machine-generated groups. Additionally, there was no significant difference in the feasibility scores among the knowledge graph, knowledge graph with personalization, and expert groups. The qualitative evaluation suggested that human CFs narrow the text to content that is easy for the client to read, whereas machine CFs are more likely to include expressions that are unnatural to the client. Conclusions: These results indicate that providing knowledge graphs to novice therapists increases the correctness, completeness, and feasibility of CF. Providing experienced therapists with knowledge graphs is suggested to improve the quality of their CF and mental health services.
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Governing Ethical Tensions in Youth Digital Mental Health Research
As mental health research increasingly aims to generate societal impact, researchers operate at the intersection of innovation and ethical responsibility. Drawing on experiences from the cocreated NEON Young Norway Study on youth recovery narratives, this viewpoint identifies four ethical tensions that arise from the existing governance frameworks in youth digital mental health research: (1) balancing safeguarding against harm with youth participation, (2) protecting privacy without undermining authentic storytelling, (3) governing unpredictable outcomes of cocreated research, and (4) meeting ethical and legal standards while ensuring youth-friendly communication. These tensions highlight limitations in mental health research that adopts participatory and digital approaches, as this often struggles to accommodate iterative designs, narrative data, and cross-sector collaboration. We argue that responsible youth mental health research requires ethics to be understood as a dynamic, participatory practice that supports safe and equitable inclusion, rather than having a focus on risk prevention. Ethical governance, therefore, needs to evolve toward proportionate, context-sensitive approaches that can enable innovation while protecting young people’s rights, agency, and voices.
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Institutional Member Updates: Summer 2026
Institutional Members are clinics and programs in the US and around the globe that offer residential and/or intensive treatment for OCD and related disorders, are specialty outpatient clinics with a large staff dedicated to treating OCD, or provide low-cost treatment options through research studies.
Below are quarterly updates from our Institutional Members organized alphabetically. Click the (+) to open each menu and read updates and find contact information for clinics near you:
Do you work at a residential program, intensive outpatient program (ITP), or specialty outpatient clinic and looking to advertise your services? Learn more about becoming an Institutional Member and having your program updates included below!
The post Institutional Member Updates: Summer 2026 appeared first on International OCD Foundation.
What Are Intrusive Thoughts?
When a child confesses a frightening thought that seemed to come out of nowhere — “What if I hurt someone with this knife?” “What if mom dies in a car accident?” “What if germs get into this paper cut and I die of an infection?” — you can both find it confusing and disturbing. But in most cases these intrusive thoughts are not evidence of a problem.
Intrusive thoughts are unwanted ideas, images, or urges that pop into the mind seemingly out of nowhere. They might feel embarrassing, violent, sexual, or just plain strange — and they feel completely out of character, which is exactly why they’re so upsetting. “An intrusive thought is a lot like your brain sending junk mail,” says Theresa Welles, PhD, a clinical psychologist and director of the Bubrick Center for Pediatric OCD at the Child Mind Institute. “Just because it shows up doesn’t mean it’s important or true or something you even want.”
It also doesn’t necessarily mean that a child has OCD or another mental health disorder. Though intrusive thoughts are associated with OCD — in which unwanted thoughts (called obsessions) drive children to perform rituals (called compulsions) to alleviate them — for many children they are just fleeting thoughts. It’s only when kids become unable to let them go that they are concerning. Another way to think about it, says Dr. Welles, is that “the brain’s job is to generate thoughts, the same way an apple tree’s job is to produce apples. Not every apple is perfect — some are misshapen or wormy. And not every thought is meaningful or worth paying attention to. Having a thought is not the same as wanting it or intending to act on it.”
Who has intrusive thoughts
“Everyone who has a brain has them,” says Caitlyn Downie, LCSW, director of trauma and resilience at the Child Mind Institute. “It’s part of the human existence.” A child might suddenly imagine something terrible happening to a parent, or a teenager might have a violent or sexual thought that feels shocking or shameful. Most of the time, these pass quickly — unpleasant, but easy enough to brush aside.
That’s the key distinction: not the thought itself, but what happens after it. The concern isn’t that the thought appeared — it’s how the child responds, how often it returns, and whether it starts getting in the way of daily life.
For some children — particularly those who are anxious, perfectionistic, or who have OCD — intrusive thoughts become “sticky.” Instead of passing through, the thought snags. The child starts paying attention to it, trying to figure it out or make it go away, which only makes it feel more powerful. “Young people lack the experience to recognize that thoughts aren’t the same as intentions, desires, or actions,” Dr. Welles says. “The thoughts feel alarming. So the child pays more attention, and the more attention they give it, the more often it returns.” That loop of fear and self-doubt is what parents and clinicians need to be alert to.
When should parents be concerned?
Many children are too ashamed or frightened to describe what’s actually going on, so parents may never hear about the thought itself. Instead, changes in behavior are often the first clue. Look for signs like:
- Increased distress, irritability, or moodiness
- Avoidance of something that wasn’t previously a problem
- Trouble concentrating or sleeping
- Excessive guilt or repeated reassurance seeking
- Rituals like checking, counting, washing hands, or going through routines in a specific way
It’s worth seeking professional support when intrusive thoughts are frequent and intense, hard to shake, causing real distress, or getting in the way of school, friendships, or daily routines.
Why intrusive thoughts feel so frightening
When an intrusive thought appears, it can set off the body’s alarm system — the same ancient survival mechanism that helped people run from danger or fight it off. In anxiety and OCD, that alarm bell rings when there’s no real emergency. The child has a thought, the body reacts with panic, and the child assumes the thought must be important because it feels big and important.
Children may also fall into what clinicians call thought-action fusion. “That’s the mistaken belief that having a thought makes it more likely to happen,” explains Dr. Welles, “or that it reveals something terrible about who they are.” A child who thinks, “What if I hurt my baby brother?” may become convinced the thought means they secretly want to — but intrusive thoughts are often the precise opposite of what a child would ever want. Paradoxically, Dr. Welles says, “for most people with anxiety disorders and OCD, these thoughts are the actual opposite of what they would ever do.”
How parents can help
The first thing to do is stay calm — harder than it sounds if the thought is violent, sexual, or taboo. Children look to their parents to gauge whether something is truly dangerous, so if you look horrified, your child takes that as confirmation the thought is something to fear.
When a child shares an intrusive thought, Downie suggests responding with warmth and curiosity: “Say something like, ‘I appreciate you telling me — it sounds like that was really scary.’ It also helps to normalize it: ‘A lot of people have thoughts they don’t particularly like.’” Some other responses that can help:
- “That sounds really upsetting — I’m glad you told me.”
- “Having a thought doesn’t mean you want it or that it’ll ever happen.”
- “You don’t have to figure this out right now.”
The goal is to help your child feel less alone and less ashamed, without treating the thought like a five-alarm emergency. And do your best to avoid reassurance. Reassuring the child about the contents of a specific thought (for example, responding to a child who asks, “Are you sure I’m a good person?” with “Yes, you’re a good person”) can actually make things worse, especially in kids with OCD. They feel very temporary relief but then the thought creeps back and they need more reassurance. It becomes a cycle. Instead try: “I know this feels awful. And I know you can handle it.”
It also helps to redirect the child to something concrete: getting dressed, eating breakfast, watching a show, texting a friend. With younger kids, you might guide them in doing slow breaths or suggest they move to another room so they distract themselves from the thought. With teens, you might mean teach them to resist the urge to Google their fears or thoughts, confess, or ask the same question over and over again. “The idea,” Downie says, “is to validate the feeling without validating the fear. You’re saying: ‘I hear you, this is hard, and you can get through it.’”
What can cause intrusive thoughts?
Intrusive thoughts aren’t a diagnosis on their own — they’re a symptom that can show up across a range of conditions, or in children who have no diagnosis at all. Disorders they may be associated with include:
- OCD: The most closely associated condition. Common themes include harm, contamination, sexual thoughts, and religious or moral fears.
- Generalized anxiety: Tends to involve repetitive “what if” worries about everyday concerns — school, safety, family, the future.
- Social anxiety: Brings intrusive thoughts about embarrassment, rejection, or being judged by peers.
- PTSD: Can involve intrusive memories, images, or sensations tied to a traumatic event. “A child who has experienced trauma may worry about being harmed again or even about harming someone else,” Downie notes, “but that doesn’t mean every child with trauma will have intrusive thoughts.”
- Depression: Often involves intrusive thoughts that fit a negative self-image: I’m worthless. I’m a burden. I’m a bad person.
- Autism spectrum disorder: Repetitive thoughts often center on a special interest and aren’t typically unwanted or distressing the way OCD thoughts are — though they can look similar from the outside.
- Psychotic disorders: Young people with psychosis tend to experience intrusive thoughts as fixed and real, without the self-awareness that typically accompanies anxiety-driven ones. Psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia are rare in children, though early signs can appear in the teenage years.
How intrusive thoughts are treated
Treatment depends on what’s driving the thoughts and how much they’re disrupting the child’s life:
- For OCD, the gold-standard treatment is exposure and response prevention (ERP), a specialized form of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) where children practice sitting with intrusive thoughts without doing compulsions. Over time, they learn to tolerate uncertainty and discover that the thought, however uncomfortable, isn’t actually dangerous.
- For anxiety, the same treatments are helpful. CBT helps children understand the connection between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, and ERP helps kids learn to tolerate the anxiety these thoughts generate, and it gradually diminishes.
- For trauma, treatment may include trauma-focused CBT. Mindfulness, DBT skills, and breathing exercises can also help regulate the nervous system.
- Family involvement matters a great deal. “Parents often need help learning how to respond without accidentally feeding the anxiety cycle,” Dr. Welles says. SPACE (Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions) is an evidence-based approach that helps parents reduce accommodation and support their child’s brave behavior instead.
- For moderate-to-severe OCD or anxiety, medication — typically an SSRI — may also be worth discussing with a psychiatrist or pediatrician.
Helping your child trust their own mind
One of the hardest things about intrusive thoughts is that they can make children afraid of their own minds — convinced that every thought needs to be examined or explained away before they can relax. But no one gets to have only pleasant, well-behaved thoughts.
What children can learn is that a thought can be upsetting without being meaningful, loud without being true, and it can pass through without becoming a verdict on who they are. As parents, the most powerful thing you can offer is a calm, steady presence — taking it seriously without treating it as a catastrophe. When your child sees you aren’t panicked, they get to borrow some of that calm for themselves.
Frequently Asked Questions
Intrusive thoughts are unwanted ideas, images, or urges that pop into your mind unexpectedly. They often feel upsetting or out of character, but they’re essentially “junk mail” from the brain — not meaningful or important.
Yes, everyone can have them. Most children (and adults) experience intrusive thoughts at times, and in many cases they pass quickly without causing problems.
They’re a normal byproduct of how the brain works, but they can become more frequent or “sticky” in kids who are anxious, perfectionistic, or dealing with conditions like OCD or trauma. Paying extra attention to the thought can also make it return more often.
No. Having an intrusive thought doesn’t mean you want to act on it or that it reflects who you are. In fact, these thoughts are often the opposite of what someone would ever want or do.
The post What Are Intrusive Thoughts? appeared first on Child Mind Institute.
Roundtables: Longevity’s Next Frontier: “Reprogramming” Your Body
Listen to the session or watch below
Billions of dollars are flooding into efforts to reverse aging as scientists explore ways to return cells to a younger state. But how far off are these experimental treatments? Will they really work? Watch a conversation exploring longevity’s new focus.
Speakers: Mary Beth Griggs, science editor and Jessica Hamzelou, senior biotechnology reporter
Recorded on June 30, 2026
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Use of a Conversational Agent for Training Mental Health Professionals in Suicide Safety Planning: Pilot Feasibility and Acceptability Study
Background: Safety planning is recognized as one of the most effective interventions for reducing suicidal behaviors. The quality of safety plans strongly depends on professional training, and traditional methods, such as role-playing, are time-consuming and offer limited opportunities for repetition across diverse patient profiles. Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) may provide innovative solutions by offering accessible, flexible, and realistic training environments. Objective: This pilot study aimed to evaluate the acceptability and feasibility of a GenAI-based simulator designed to train mental health professionals in safety planning. Methods: Twenty nurses and nursing assistants from psychiatric units in a French university hospital participated in a pre-post, single-session evaluation. After self-rating their ability, competence, and willingness to manage patients experiencing suicidal ideation, participants interacted individually with the text-based simulator for 20 minutes to perform a safety plan with a chatbot, then completed postsimulation acceptability items, and open-ended feedback. Composite scores were computed: acceptability (eg, helpfulness; 0‐40), realism (eg, looking like real interaction with patient; 0‐20), and challenge (eg, emotional challenge; 0‐30). Pre-post changes were tested (Wilcoxon signed-rank test), and age-group comparisons were performed. Results: Acceptability was high (mean 31.9/40, SD 5.3; median 32, IQR 7), realism moderate-to-high (mean 15.1/20, SD 4.1; median 15, IQR 5.25), and challenge manageable (mean 17.0/30, SD 8; median 18, IQR 12.5). Participants rated usefulness (mean 7.65/10, SD 1.57; median 8, IQR 1.57), perceived learning (mean 7.6/10, SD 1.79; median 8, IQR 2), recommendation to use the chatbot for training (mean 8.3/10, SD 1.59; median 9, IQR 2.25), and feedback quality (mean 8.35/10, SD 1.27; median 8.5, IQR 1.25) favorably. Willingness to actively manage patients experiencing suicidal ideation significantly increased postsimulation (.03). Younger participants reported higher acceptability (.04) and realism (.03). Participants reported minimal concerns regarding the simulator’s use. Conclusions: This pilot study demonstrates that a GenAI-based simulator for safety planning is feasible and highly acceptable among experienced mental health professionals. The findings are promising and warrant larger, controlled trials to assess impacts on training effectiveness and patient outcomes.
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<![CDATA[Why psychiatry’s growing “tribalism” harms care—and how clinicians, academia, and pharma can unite to tackle untreated mental illness.]]>