Posted by Pfinstegg on October 23, 2002, at 22:28:17
In reply to Re: So - what if you DO have a prob. w/ cortisol?, posted by Jerrympls on October 23, 2002, at 21:49:08
Well, there's no easy answer. I am presently taking tianeptine, which doesn't lower cortisol, but does protect the hippocampus from it. The hope is that it will allow the hippocampus to slowly regain a more normal size, start branching out dendrites and making a few new neurons, and that, if you continue taking it over an extended period, you may regain a more normal amount of D2-3 receptors, which will allow the hippocampus to take up the cortisol again, and thus tell the hypothalamus to stop pumping out so much CRH- in other words, the hope is that you can reverse the HPA dysregulation, entirely or partly.
No-one knows if this is possible to do, but I do have a very interested endocrinologist who wants to follow the cortisols and the DST every 2 months to see. If this fails, and he feels my general health is becoming endangered, he said he will consider ketanozodole or mefipristone- short courses of them- he's just considering now, not committed!
Some articles which might be helpful to you are:
1.Prevention of stress-induced morphological and cognitive consequences, McEwen et al, Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology, Rockefeller University, NY, Eur Neuropsychpharmacol, 1997 Oct, 7 Suppl 3:,S323-8 (reasons for using tianeptine)
2.Antiglucocorticoid treatment of depression: double-blind ketanozodole, Biol Psychiatry 1999 Apr 15;45(8):1070-4 (from Wolkowitz, et al, University of California, San Francisco)
3.Rapid reversal of psychotic depression using mefipristone J Clin Psychopharmacol 2001 Oct; 21(5):516-21 (from Belanoff, Schatzberg et al, Stanford University Medical Center)
As you can see, this will be a slow process for me, but I promised earlier that I will post my cortisol levels as I learn them, so you can see how this guinea pig is doing!
Pfinstegg
poster:Pfinstegg
thread:124700
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20021019/msgs/124957.html