Luke Sheridan Rains

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Luke is a research associate in the NIHR Mental Health Policy Research Unit in the Division of Psychiatry, UCL. Before this, he was the trial manager of CIRCLE, a large randomised controlled trial of a contingency management intervention for helping Early Intervention in Psychosis service users quit cannabis use. He is currently completing his doctoral thesis, which is investigating the cognitive-behavioural mechanism underlying the CIRCLE intervention and quitting cannabis in psychosis. His interests include mental health policy, psychotic illness, and evidence based treatment for substance misuse in severe mental illness. His first degree was in philosophy before he moved into mental health research. He is interested in the philosophy of mental illness.

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Daily skunk cannabis use associated with a 5-fold increase in psychosis risk

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Luke Sheridan-Reins explores a recent paper on the contribution of cannabis use to variation in the incidence of psychotic disorder across Europe.

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Mental Health Act detentions are increasing, but why?

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Luke Sheridan-Rains summarises a study containing data on the use of the Mental Health Act in England over the last 30 years, which points to an inexorable rise in involuntary admissions.

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Medical cannabis for mental illness: current use is not supported by research #MHQT

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As we prepare for our Cannabis #MHQT event on Wed 26 Sep, Luke Sheridan Rains dissects a narrative review that asks: Is cannabis treatment for anxiety, mood, and related disorders ready for prime time?

His answer is that current evidence does not support the use of medical cannabis for mental illnesses such as anxiety or depression.

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Is Cannabidiol (CBD) an effective antipsychotic?

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Luke Sheridan Rains publishes his debut blog on a recent multicentre RCT of Cannabidiol (CBD) as an adjunctive therapy for people with schizophrenia, which suggests that CBD had a beneficial, but modest impact on positive psychotic symptoms and severity of illness when used alongside existing antipsychotics.

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