This past week in class we discussed the various medications being used to treat bipolar disorder. In the article we were assigned to read for the week, it discusses what exactly bipolar disorder is, how the disorder is treated, and the most plausible explanation for what is occurring in the brains of those affected by bipolar disorder.
There are two different types of bipolar disorder, bipolar I which is characterized by alternating periods of mania and depression, or bipolar II which is characterized by alternating periods of hypomania and depression. The disorder itself is linked to multiple different genes within the human genome. There are 88 different risk alleles, or genetic sequences, that are present in those with bipolar disorder. If someone has fifteen of these sequences then they are at a significantly higher risk than the general population. Besides the alternating cycles of moods, bipolar disorder brings with it many other health problems. Bipolar sufferers often take up smoking or substance abuse in their manic phases. The treatments for this disorder can bring on obesity and diabetes in the patient. Perhaps one of the worst things facing a bipolar disorder sufferer however is the increased chance of suicide that they face which is 10 to 20 times the rate among the general population.
As for the treatment of Bipolar Disorder, doctors use a technique called rational polypharmacy, which pretty much amounts to treating new symptoms as they pop up with various mood stabilizers, antipsychotics, antidepressants, and hypnotic benzodiazepines.
And this really only gets to the heart of the matter in that researchers do not really know yet what the root causes of Bipolar Disorder is, but they think that it has something to do with arachidonic acid. The theory here lies in that the chemicals that are used to treat the symptoms of bipolar disorder are interfering with the actions of arachidonic acid in the cell. Therefore, the researchers believe that the chemicals are correcting a chemical imbalance with regards to arachidonic acid.
For our discussions this week we talked about treatment of bipolar disorder and what it means for society. We talked about what it would mean for society if we found a cure for Bipolar Disorder, or more to the point if we even needed to find a cure immediately. We had the good luck to have two people who have happened to know someone with bipolar disorder and they both agreed that the disorder does not really affect them that much as long as they stay on their medications. This kind of segued into our next discussion question about the affects on the body that mood stabilizers have, namely obesity and diabetes and if these could possibly be worse side effects than the others because they could contribute to the depression that is felt by sufferers. I think we agreed in the end that this is merely a matter of adaption the same as learning to take all of your medication, the sufferer needed to take into account the weight gain that they would experience in the course of their treatment. I think the most interesting conversation we had however was about mood itself, namely are we misdiagnosing bipolar disorder in people who are just emotional. Like could we possibly be medicating people who are not like bipolar disorder sufferers in that their mood swings are chemically induced, but that the mood swings that these people experience are the result of them being more open with their feelings than the rest of us. It made me for one wonder whether as a society we use drugs to help people, or to make them more like the rest of us. I mean you have to take into account people who suffer from some sort of mental problems, but contribute so much to the arts and sciences.
That’s all for this week, next week’s topic will be the relationship between leptin and obesity
Exploring Mood Stabilizers for their use in Bipolar Disorder
