DST Myth Busted, Maternal Gaps, Keto Training

A 157-study review finds little evidence clock changes harm mental health; Missouri reports preventable maternal deaths and keto clinician training.

According to The Guardian, a major international study including Swinburne University's Dr Ben Bullock and Prof Greg Murray reviewed 157 studies from 36 countries over a decade and found only weak and inconsistent evidence that daylight saving time shifts affect mental health, including depression and substance abuse rates. Published in the European Journal of Epidemiology, the review found some people experience effects similar to minor jet lag, but no association with significant declines in mental health.

The finding is striking because claims that clock changes damage mental health have featured prominently in the US debate, where the American Academy of Sleep Medicine argues permanent standard time would mean 'less depression and suicide', while President Trump is pushing to make DST permanent via the Sunshine Protection Act, which the House has passed. Bullock told The Guardian that correlations between clock changes and changes in sleep or accidents are easy to show, but causal studies proving daylight saving is to blame are very difficult to run, and the team also flagged possible confounders like latitude, health status, commuting behaviour and even the nocebo effect.

The research, as reported by The Guardian, found that when DST begins it appears associated with increased acute myocardial infarction and fatal traffic accidents, but also with decreased crimes involving physical harm. When it ends, the pattern reverses: decreased all-cause mortality and workplace accidents, but increased violent crime. Within the DST period there appear to be fewer all-cause deaths and fewer traffic accidents, and the authors wrote that standard time is potentially associated with decreased sleep duration during winter, yet 'no clear and consistent effects on psychiatric outcomes are identified'.

The Kansas City Beacon reports that Missouri's latest Pregnancy-Associated Mortality Review found mental health conditions, including substance use, contributed to nearly a quarter of the state's 108 pregnancy-related deaths from 2019 to 2023 — 17 from mental health conditions and seven from substance use disorder — and that the board determined nearly 80% of all reviewed deaths were preventable, including every mental health and substance use death. Screenings aren't mandatory in Missouri, providers failed to complete them in 38 of the deaths, and the state's mortality rate was 2.9 times higher for women on Medicaid and 2.5 times higher for Black women than for white women.

Per The Kansas City Beacon, perinatal psychiatrist Nancy Byatt likened mental health screenings to checking blood pressure: identifying risk and then leaving the patient to find care on their own is inadequate, and about two-thirds of postpartum depression begins before birth, so screening should start during pregnancy. Missouri earned a C in 2026 from the Policy Center for Maternal Mental Health, up from a D-minus in 2023, and its Maternal Health Access Project — modeled on programs in 31 states — lets providers consult psychiatrists rather than referring every patient to scarce specialists, since nearly every county is a mental health professional shortage area.

Newswise reports that University of Maryland School of Medicine researchers found an immersive two-part training program, Live It ~ Launch It, substantially increased confidence among 40 US health care professionals in using ketogenic metabolic therapy — roughly 75% calories from fat, under 10% from carbs — for patients with difficult-to-treat schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and depression; 25 participants also tried the diet themselves for four weeks. The findings, published in Frontiers in Psychiatry, are preliminary, and researchers say randomized trials are still needed. The DST authors, per The Guardian, called for more robust causal research, while Bullock's advice for clock-change weekend was simple: make the most of the extra daylight and be careful at transition times.