Posted by MM on July 7, 2001, at 13:01:53
In reply to Re: Borna Virus Linked With Severe Mood Disorders , posted by AMenz on July 7, 2001, at 10:57:37
Amantadine looks like something to try. I don't know about the test, but would taking an antiviral hurt?? Also, when I looked up "bipolar & borna" I found a lot of sites. Is this well known????
Parkinson's Drug Knocks Out Depression
WASHINGTON, D.C.--A drug used to treat Parkinson's disease has wiped out symptoms of bipolar disorder in two people. The findings, presented here Saturday at the Biomedicine '97 meeting, raise hopes of a better treatment for this form of depression--which affects 1% of people in the United States--and support a provocative theory that a virus may play a role in the disorder.
Clinical virologists Liv Bode and Hanns Ludwig of the Robert Koch Institute in Berlin had shown previously that the Borna virus, first isolated in 1928 from horses, can suppress the startle response in rats and trigger behavioral problems such as listlessness in other animals. The virus replicates most actively in the limbic system, the brain region that controls memory, behavior, and mood. The duo also has found that about 50% of people with bipolar disorder are infected with the virus or have antibodies to it, compared to just 1% of the general population.
The German team's most recent discovery was serendipitous. The researchers had given a 67-year-old Parkinson's victim amantadine sulfate, a standard drug against the disease. The woman also had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and was infected with Borna virus. To the researchers' delight, the drug purged both the virus and symptoms of depression; the patient has been free of depression for 10 months. In a second case, a 30-year-old woman prone to bipolar disorder since age 13 reported a dramatic improvement in her mood 9 days after starting an amantadine sulfate regimen. Within 2 weeks, all traces of Borna viral protein and DNA had disappeared from her blood.
The unforeseen success has emboldened Bode's group to begin recruiting subjects for a placebo-controlled trial to test amantadine sulfate's effectiveness. Bode says she's eager to find a new treatment to offer patients, many of whom no longer respond to traditional antidepressants. "I have such a lot of patients who are so desperate. They have tried everything," she says.
Other experts say they are intrigued by the findings. However, the drug's success doesn't prove a link between the Borna virus and depression, cautions George Chrousos, a pediatric endocrinologist at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development in Bethesda, Maryland. "They're getting there, but they're not there yet," he says.
> Great but how do you get tested, and is there a "cure".
>
> > Borna Disease Virus Linked With Severe Mood Disorders
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > LONDON (Reuters Health) Jul 05 - High amounts of circulating immune complexes of Borna disease virus correlates with severity of depression, investigators in Germany report.
> >
> > Borna disease virus targets limbic structure neurons and is known to cause behavioral abnormalities in animals, Dr. Liv Bode of the Robert Koch-Institut in Berlin and colleagues explain in the July issue of Molecular Psychiatry.
> >
> > Using a highly sensitive enzyme immune assay to analysis 3000 human plasma samples, Dr. Bode's group found that Borna disease virus-specific circulating immune complexes in humans were approximately "10 times higher" than that detected by previous serologic studies.
> >
> > In group of 28 patients with major depressive disorder or depressive crisis in bipolar disorder and 28 patients with moderate depressive symptoms, the infection rate approached 100%, Dr. Bode's group reports. Infection rates in a healthy control group of 65 subjects was only 32%. The investigators also noted that high immune complex levels paralleled severe depression.
> >
> > The investigators conclude that "an etiopathogenic role of Borna disease virus in mood disorders seems considerably strengthened, given the significant coincidence of severe disease and antigenemia."
> >
> > Mol Psychiatry 2001;6:481-491.
poster:MM
thread:69244
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010701/msgs/69294.html