Inflammatory Cause of Bipolar Disorder Suggests New Treatments

[The Straight Story]

Inflammatory Cause of Bipolar Disorder Suggests New Treatments


PARIS – Recently reported evidence implicating inflammatory mediators in the pathophysiology of bipolar disorder and major depression have opened the door to testing new agents for treating these psychiatric disorders or slowing their progression.

"Bipolar disorder is associated with neuroprogression, and oxidative stress, neurotrophins, and inflammation may underpin this process, Dr. Michael Berk said at the annual Congress of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology. "Early interventions can potentially improve the outcome" of bipolar disorder, and the new findings give new opportunities to find effective neuroprotective agents, said Dr. Berk, professor and chairman of psychiatry at Deakin University in Geelong, Australia.

"We increasingly think there is a systemic biology that underpins" bipolar disorder and potentially other inflammatory diseases. "The brain does not exist in isolation, and we need to understand that pathways similar to those that underpin risks for cardiovascular disorders, stroke, and osteoporosis might also underpin the risk for psychiatric disorders, and that other treatments might be helpful," he said in an interview.

Based on this concept, and supported by suggestive results from epidemiologic studies, Dr. Berk said he and his associates are running a prospective, randomized study assessing a role for aspirin in treating bipolar disorder, and that they are seeking funding for a second study to test combined treatment with a statin and aspirin in bipolar disorder patients.

http://www.clinicalpsychiatrynews.com/specialty-focus/bipolar-disorder/single-article-page/inflammatory-cause-of-bipolar-disorder-suggests-new-treatments/fac7f33968.html

[unblock]

1. i have a tough time believing a solution so simple could be overlooked.

so many people have bipolar disorder, and so many people take aspirin, i find it hard to believe this connection hasn't been made already if it's valid and reasonably strong.

of course, aspirin may not be the ideal treatment -- maybe it only helps slightly -- but studying its effects may point the way to a more effective solution, perhaps a more targetted anti-inflammatory treatment.

it would be very interesting if inflammation plays a role.

[Yo_Mama]

2. Inflammation has been implicated in other types of mental illness

I seem to recall a case of a young boy who developed Obsessive-Compulsive disorder, later traced to an infection of the brain.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8768351

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18091077

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17853982

More accessible article:
http://www.miriametucker.com/Does_Strep_Cause_OCD_in_Kid.html

Because Obsessive-Compulsive disorder frequently does start early in life, there may well be an underlying infectious cause in many of these cases:
http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=By_Illness&Template=/TaggedPage/TaggedPageDisplay.cfm&TPLID=54&ContentID=23035

Brain injury has been shown to cause Obsessive Compulsive disorder.

It's not clear that aspirin would work against infection or autoimmune reactions.

Strep is believed to cause vascular disease as well.

[usregimechange]

5. Cause is a strong word when it comes to human problems

[Yo_Mama]

6. Sometimes it is not

Really the brain is a just a bunch of circuits - if you are unlucky enough to pop a small blood vessel or develop a tumor in certain regions the effects are pretty predictable. Some of this stuff can be cured and some not, but my guess is that most serious mental illness has a strong physical basis. That doesn't mean it is easy to cure, and once you have abated the physical threat it often requires retraining to rebuild function.

Schizophrenia clearly has a physical cause.

As brain imaging becomes more detailed they have learned a lot. That doesn't mean that most of us don't have some software errors (neurotic unrealistic thinking), but a lot of mental disease seems founded in organic dysfunction. We are so used to being able to control our mental processes that most of us have a bias to believe that it is wrong thinking. But anxiety disorders and so forth can be caused by inflammation, and I think OBCD is really a type of anxiety disorder.

A lot of people have the sensation of being depressed emotionally when they are coming down with some sorts of viral infections, which I believe is quite physical. The evidence is mounting that genetics combined with nutritional deficiencies has some influence on the development of mental disease.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2248201/?tool=pmcentrez
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15123503
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10232294
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17988367
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20413162
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12640327

This is a new trend in research and the evidence is building.

[pnwmom]

3. The solution would not be so simple.

There are many reasons for inflammatory processes in the body, and sometimes it's a combination of several things that finally cause the symptoms.

[bananas]

4. You'd be surprised at how often the simple solutions are overlooked.

Here's one example: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=228x84571