# Hope from new scientific focus



## RamonX (Feb 10, 2011)

Bit technical this, sorry, but it might offer some hope, so I hope you Will read it anyway.

PsychoNeuroImmunology. (say this ten times as quickly as possible while brushing your teeth), is a relatively young science that studies the relationship between the brain and the immune system. Scientists have believed for a long time that the brain and psychiatric disorders might have an impact on the bodies immune system, but they also believed that the immune system did not influence the brain directly in return. However recently a silent revolution is enfolding itself, because there is an explosion of research that proves that the immune system has a major impact upon the functioning of brain. There also have been found impressive and specific alterations in the immune systems of people with Major Depression, Bipolar Disorder and Schizophrenia.

It turns out that important chemicals that the immune system uses for communication, socalled Cytokines are also found in the brain where they influence levels of neurotransmitters like Dopamine, Serotonin and endorphins.

This means that inflammation somewhere in the body can trigger, cause or influence a disorder like depression or panic disorder. And more importantly, it is thought now that low level inflammation, viruses and allergic reactions are all important contributors to psychiatric disorders.
An interesting observation is for instance that many people with anxiety disorders have Irritable Bowel Syndrome as well. Researchers have assumed for à long time that the anxiety and processes in the brain caused IBS, but now the opposite is being researched as well.

When healthy people are injected with these messenger chemicals called Cytokines (that normally accompangy inflammation) they really experience à state that mimmicks depression or anxiety disorders. The biological function of this is to immobilize the body and separate it from other people, to make sure all resources are used for healing and to make sure disease can't be spread around easily. We all experience this to à certain degree when catching à serious flu. The fact that we feel so lousy is largely due to Cytokine production.

So does this mean every psychiatric disorder is caused by inflammation or other immune reactions. No ofcourse not. psychological factors and vulnerabilities in the brain, and stress still are very important, but there is another factor that is important which is immune reaction, and this is one that hopefully and probably can be influenced.

So how could this help us, or at least some of us?
First there is the possibility of tuning down one or more Cytokines in the brain. How does this work? 
The balance between inflammation and noninflammation in the body seems to be very sensitive in a substantial number of people. It could well be that the immune system is just a bit overactive without à real threat being present in the body. (there never was or, there isn't anymore).
Psychological stress also influences this. Actually the body teacts to stress the same way, wether the origin is physical (disease, physical activity) or 
Psychological (divorce stress). 
Many substances and also food have à large impact on the expression of Cytokines. Painkillers for instance. 
Simple addition of aspirin to antipsychotic medication has been used succesfully in this trial:

Adding aspirin to antipsychotics reduces psychopathology in adults with schizophrenia spectrum disorders

Alas à lot of immune system modulators are very new and very expensive, and it is still not clear which one could help for which disorder in which 
person. It seems that in different disorders and different persons the kind of cytokines that are overexpressed also differ. But there are also relatively cheap over the counter supplements and even diets that can reduce low level inflammation.

In another post I hope to describe why this could be especially relevant for DP/DR. Please let me know if there is anything I should explain better.


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## kate_edwin (Aug 9, 2009)

well..........maybe. but i had some weird labs a couple years ago which resulted in a *full* immunology/hematology workup and they found absolutely nothing wrong........so apparently immune function wouldn't be a factor in my case..........and i've never noticed asprin having any effects ,and there's no lit on asprin and psychiatry.......


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## Guest (Aug 24, 2011)

This is excellent. I read about myself re: this.

I think I actually fit this category. I also have a friend with schizoprhenia who has multiple auto-immune problems -- serious ones.

I hate to admit this, but I have had IBS (it is more under control with diet), I have had allergies since a child and asthma, also improved, I also have had cancer now at 52 which is more common for my age however I have other autoimmune problems I won't mention.

I don't care anymore what I talk about. I have a lot of faith in this new research, but become depressed when I think ... will I benefit from these treatments in MY lifetime.

But this is why I have hope for so many of the younger people on the board.

But I won't give up.

Again, thank you RamonX.


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## RamonX (Feb 10, 2011)

kate_edwin said:


> well..........maybe. but i had some weird labs a couple years ago which resulted in a *full* immunology/hematology workup and they found absolutely nothing wrong........so apparently immune function wouldn't be a factor in my case..........and i've never noticed asprin having any effects ,and there's no lit on asprin and psychiatry.......


Well, in a way, this is still early days, and it is still not clear for how many people this could be an issue. But research suggests that often cyttokine levels in blood can be completely normal, while they are changed in cerebrospinal liqor. In normal standard test these things are not measured.
In psychosis they found à very specific rise of a cytokine called Interleukine 2 in cerebro spinal fluid, while no changes were found in blood in a substantial number of patients. There is preliminary evidence that it has to do with the common herpes virus (cold sore virus) infecting the brain.

About the aspirin, it has to be taken daily for weeks before the effects would become noticable, and the fact that it works in schizophrenia, does not mean it will work in other condition. It seems every condition has it's own pattern of specific cytokines being activated.
Roughly interleukine 1 and 6 have been associated with depression and interleukine 2 with psychosis, but this is all not clear yet, because there are many different cytokines, and many haven't even been discovered yet.
There is not much of literature on aspirin in psychiatry because it is à completely new strategy to try anti-inflammatory medication.
Hopefully depersonalization research will also start researching this.


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## RamonX (Feb 10, 2011)

Dreamer* said:


> I think I actually fit this category. I also have a friend with schizoprhenia who has multiple auto-immune problems -- serious ones.
> 
> I hate to admit this, but I have had IBS (it is more under control with diet), I have had allergies since a child and asthma, also improved, I also have had cancer now at 52 which is more common for my age however I have other autoimmune problems I won't mention.
> 
> I don't care anymore what I talk about. I have a lot of faith in this new research, but become depressed when I think ... will I benefit from these treatments in MY lifetime.


There are a lot of people in my family with several auto-immune issues. I also have IBS, and have had all kinds of low level infections. 
And before this last episode started, the last few years I became evermore tired.

It is hard to say how long it will take before this research can benefit us, but I have some hope that it could offer some hope soon, because it is relevant in so many area's. Immune system alterations seem to be implicated in Alzheimers, heart disease, CFS/ME, MS, many psychiatric disorders and many more. I really hope the likes of Sierra and Simeon will pick up on this, but I doubt they will, or are able to. 
An advantage could be that allready there are many substances that can influence these cytokine ratio's.
I will be looking into this soon, and I hope to get my psychiatrist interested as well.


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