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In an occasional column, NEJM Journal Watch Psychiatry editors comment briefly on review articles.
Update on addictions: Neuroscience, treatment, and future directions. This authoritative review1 both concisely examines the neurobiology of addiction risk and the addicted brain and considers strategies for prevention and new pharmacological approaches to addiction and withdrawal. These include targeting behavioral endophenotypes associated with addiction (e.g., impulse control, planning, decision making, stress reactivity), repurposing medications approved for other indications (e.g., bupropion, lofexidine, lorcaserin), focusing on increasingly precise molecular targets (e.g., specific intracellular signaling pathways of mu-opioid, kappa-opio…