Melbourne Researchers Break Through On Schizophrenia

Main Category: Schizophrenia
Also Included In: Psychology / Psychiatry;  Mental Health
Article Date: 21 May 2009 - 6:00 PDT

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In a world first, Melbourne scientists have made a critical breakthrough in understanding the differences in the brains of people with schizophrenia.

Scientists from the Mental Research Health Institute have discovered that 25 per cent of people diagnosed with schizophrenia can be separated from other people with the same diagnoses. Professor Brian Dean, who is leading the research, likened the breakthrough to the advances made with diabetes when scientists found a split in Type 1 (insulin deficient) and Type 2 (insulin resistant) diabetes.

"It was the first step in developing different treatments used for the two disorders."

"The same will be true for schizophrenia, a syndrome that affects one in 100 people."

The team is now working to understand the differences in the brains of people with Muscarinic Receptor Deficit Schizophrenia (MRDS), the form of the disease they have identified, and other forms of schizophrenia.

"Now we can study a form of schizophrenia in isolation, it makes it much easier to see what is changed in the brains of subjects with MRDS."

"This significant step forward is helping us to unravel the potential causes of the MRDS disorder, so that we are able to develop better treatments."

With no blood test or other marker available currently to diagnose schizophrenia, the illness is currently diagnosed by the presence of other specific symptoms that cannot be accounted for, unlike psychiatric illnesses induced by brain tumours or brain injury.

Professor Brian Dean and his team focused their work on brain tissue from 154 deceased people.

The scientists made very thin sections (14 thousands of a millimetre thick) of the brain tissue to measure the levels of the muscarinic M1 receptor using a radioactive drug that binds to the receptor.

The next phase of the research is working with Professor Christos Pantelis and his group at the University of Melbourne to complete a neuroimaging study to identify living people with MRDS. "What we are hoping for is to come up with a marker to diagnose schizophrenia over the next two years," said Professor Dean.

Source
Mental Research Health Institute

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