"extacy impares memory" article antagonist

[Swimster]

Ok, some may have read the thread of "EXTACY imparing memory" news
thread, or elseware, or rumored form anyone else(friends, i don't know)
but instead of writting about a nice little antagonist thread\article, i found
a nice little article about it at MAPS.org. For those of you who havent read
the thread by shroomonger, follow this link here:http://www.drugs-forum.com/forum/sho...ecstacy+memory

now... to the good stuff....
Retreived:@ http://www.maps.org/sys/nq.pl?id=1367&fmt=page

NOTE: I boldfaced my faviorite paragraph!

Originally Posted by MAPS.org

Commentary on news coverage of ecstasy user/memory meta-analysis



Ilsa Jerome

Several news reports have appeared discussing a paper to be published in the journal Human Psychopharmacology finding that ecstasy use is related to impaired verbal memory, but not impaired visual memory. This would hardly be newsworthy, considering the history of previous ecstasy user studies, except that this paper examined over 600 people. Some news reports even state in headlines that taking ecstasy once can impair verbal memory. However, this claim is unfounded and cannot be made on the basis of this study.

What is not made clear in all news reports, though some do note it, is that the study is a meta-analysis. That means that the authors are combining data from already-published studies in a way that lets them treat it as if it were one large sample. This meta-analysis relies on previous retrospective studies of ecstasy users. This also means that the findings are not especially surprising, given that the majority of retrospective studies reached this conclusion, with or without additional qualifiers

The meta-analysis is drawing on data from retrospective studies that already have methodological problems. Specifically, polydrug use is a strong confound in nearly all comparisons of ecstasy users, with very few studies able to find people whose use of alcohol and other substances matches that of ecstasy users (Gouzoulis-Mayfrank et al. 2006). Studies with well-matched controls tend to find fewer differences between ecstasy users and non-users (Halpern et al. 2004). As well, all retrospective studies raise issues of pre-existing differences between people who use ecstasy, especially regularly, and people who don't. For instance, there is some indication that people who use ecstasy regularly may have psychological problems before they even start using it (Huizink et al. 2006). To learn something new, researchers have already started to turn away from retrospective to prospective studies that assess people before and after using ecstasy.

Previously, some researchers had assessed people who had never taken ecstasy before before and after receiving 1.5 mg/kg MDMA, and they presented this data at a conference (Ludewig et al. 2003). Another prospective study found differences in people who used ecstasy versus those who did not, but performance in both groups was within the normal range and we have raised questions about aspects of this report (Schilt et al. 2007). As well, preliminary observations of memory tests performed at the start and the end of Michael Mithoefer's study do not indicate impaired memory after two sessions of MDMA-assisted therapy

As well, very few studies have attempted to assess the identity or purity of the street ecstasy people were taking, and when one research team attempted to do this, they found that even people convinced they were only taking MDMA were in fact taking MDA and amphetamine as well.

Some news reports note that the minimum lifetime dose for the entire collection of 26 studies was 19 tablets, and average lifetime use is over 300 tablets. That means that the findings do not apply to light ecstasy use. Certainly none of the studies investigated the effects of a few doses of MDMA as would be seen in clinical trials. The authors did not find a relationship between lifetime ecstasy dose and degree of verbal memory, but this does not mean that even light ecstasy use can impair memory. As noted above, use of other substances or pre-existing problems might be involved, and given the minimum versus average lifetime use, the sample likely contains more heavy than light users to start with. I will have more to say on the paper after a thorough reading of the paper, but a cursory glance suggests that the authors are more aware of the problems with retrospective studies in ecstasy users than the journalists covering the study, as they mention the problem of polydrug use in ecstasy user research.

However, after reading more detailed news reports, I conclude that there is nothing alarming within this meta-analysis and little that is genuinely new. It does not