Depression is a physical illness

Wednesday, September 13th, 2017

Depression is a physical illness, research suggests — one that could be treated with anti-inflammatory drugs:

A raft of recent papers, and unexpected results from clinical trials, have shown that treating inflammation seems to alleviate depression.

Likewise when doctors give drugs to boost the immune system to fight illness it is often accompanied by depressive mood — in the same way as how many people feel down after a vaccination.

Professor Ed Bullmore, Head of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge, believes a new field of ‘immuno-neurology’ is on the horizon.

“It’s pretty clear that inflammation can cause depression,” he told a briefing in London to coincide with this week’s Academy of Medical Sciences FORUM annual lecture which has brought together government the NHS and academics to discuss the issue.

“In relation to mood, beyond reasonable doubt, there is a very robust association between inflammation and depressive symptoms. We give people a vaccination and they will become depressed. Vaccine clinics could always predict it, but they could never explain it.

“The question is does the inflammation drive the depression or vice versa or is it just a coincidence?

“In experimental medicine studies if you treat a healthy individual with an inflammatory drug, like interferon, a substantial percentage of those people will become depressed. So we think there is good enough evidence for a causal effect.”

[...]

The immune system triggers an inflammatory response when it feels it is under threat, sparking wide-ranging changes in the body such as increasing red blood cells, in anticipation that it may need to heal a wound soon.

Scientists believe that associated depression may have brought an evolutionary benefit to our ancestors. If an ill or wounded tribal member became depressed and withdrawn it would prevent a disease being passed on.

[...]

Around 60 per cent of people referred to cardiologists with chest pain do not have a heart problem but are suffering from anxiety.

Figures also show that around 30 per cent of people suffering from inflammatory diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis are depressed — more than four times higher than the normal population.

Likewise people who are depressed after a heart attack are much more likely to suffer a second one, while the lifespan for people with cancer is hugely reduced for people with mental illness.

[...]

One promising treatment for depression on the horizon is the use of electrical stimulation to change the signals between the brain and the immune system.

Prof Kevin Tracey, President and CEO, of the US Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, discovered that the brain controls production of a deadly inflammatory chemical called TNF, which if released in high doses can be fatal, causing people to, literally, die of shock.

He has recently developed a electrical device which reproduces the connection and switches off the chemical. Three quarters of patients with rheumatoid arthritis recovered following trials.

Comments

  1. Slovenian Guest says:

    What increases systemic inflammation? Carbohydrates.

    Inflammation is also what causes coronary artery disease, not cholesterol, that tightening of arteries? Inflammation!

    And “yuppie flu”? Funniest thing ever, it sounds like something out of Seinfeld.

Leave a Reply