The incidence of autism has been rising dramatically in recent years, and as a society, we must sit and wonder, is there anything we can do to stop it? We recently learned more about how autism is thought to occur, and discovered that autism may occur as a result of nerve cells in our brains failing to connect to the proper targets, and thus the so-called “wiring” in the brain of someone with autism isn’t in quite the right order. It is encouraging to learn, however, that some people (between 3 and 25%) diagnosed with autism will eventually “grow out of it,” and will no longer exhibit the behaviors necessary for an autism diagnosis.
In addition to synaptic dysfunction, it is believed that there is abnormal signaling in the neurons of the basal forebrain that are related to acetylcholine. The levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor are also very elevated in people with autism. Acetylcholine acts as an anti-inflammatory neurotransmitter in many cases, and so with its dysfunction, there are also some abnormal amounts of inflammation seen in those with autism.
It seems that polyunsaturated fatty acids might play a big role in helping to limit some of the negative effects of autism. They can help inhibit the production of cytokines, which will lead to inflammation, and may also contribute to the formation of the appropriate synapses which are absent in autism. They will also help contribute to neuronal survival. Unfortunately, the levels of polyunsaturated fatty acids are lowered in autism, but if we can effectively supplement these or reversing this pathology, we might have a chance to try and limit the effects of autism that we see. It might also be helpful to help supplement brain-derived neurotrophic factor. Yet another thing that might be helpful in limiting the effects of autism involves making sure nitric oxide levels are neither too high nor too low, as both situations can have adverse effects due to nitric oxides role as a neurotransmitter, but also due to its toxicity at higher levels.
Whether you understood anything I just told you or not, you can probably take away one important message. The pathogenesis of autism is quite complex, and something that will likely take much more research if we are to ever have any hope of developing effective treatments or finding some sort of cure. We did find one promising medication through our study of this article, but whether it is truly effective appears to be something that still needs to be investigated in more depth. This article was yet another reminder of how complex some of these neurological conditions are, and that often there is no easy answer in the treatment of many of these. Though we can investigate many different avenues for many of these conditions, truly finding solutions becomes much more complex because we need to make sure we aren’t affecting other systems adversely when we try and bring things from the diseased state to the normal state. Indeed, drug development is a very complex process.
Overcoming the Complexity of Autism to Find Treatments
