new article--anorexia nervosa

[EAMom]

Check this out folks!

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3061844/

 

here is a quote from the study:

 

Our results show that a low dose (100 mg/day) of amantadine, a drug which abruptly suppresses adrenal sympathetic activity,9,11 was able to abolish symptoms of anorexia nervosa in 22 affected patients when it was administered 45 minutes before the main meal, and also when it was administered 45 minutes before an oral glucose tolerance test (manuscript in preparation). Patients were able to eat all types of foods and recovered their normal body weight. Normalization of cardiovascular parameters (enhancement of diastolic blood pressure and reduction of systolic blood pressure and heart rate) were registered in all cases. Namely, the present research confirms that the anorexia nervosa syndrome is underpinned by an overwhelming predominance of adrenal sympathetic branch activity which abrogates neural sympathetic activity. This pathophysiological disorder includes symptoms at all levels (cardiovascular, digestive, metabolic, endocrine, respiratory, etc), as well as psychological and neuroautonomic disturbances.

Edited June 1, 2011 by EAMom

[mkur]

Thanks

[norcalmom]

Interesting. How they measure sympathetic adrenal activity (wondering if panda-anorexia have this too - actually wondering if all pandas kids have it and perhaps anorexia is just a manifestation of pandas...)

 

My child doesn't have anoerxia - but as Dr K pointed out - many of these kids have food related issues - and he put my child in that category even thought the food/swallowing issues are with me swallowing - not DS.

 

Do you know anything about the drug they used in the study?

 

Thanks for posting!

[Buster]

Yes, the underlying drug used is amantadine, an N-methyl-D-aspartate (glutamate) antagonist. They found in http://www.springerlink.com/content/724p204w617032k7/fulltext.pdf that the drug provoked a selective enhancement of noradrenaline plus a minimization of adrenaline, dopamine, plasma serotonin and platelet serotonin circulating levels. Still trying to figure out the study and what else might be going on.

 

Buster

[norcalmom]

Is see it is used in Parkinson's disease. Keep us updated - it may be something all pandas kids could used. Do you know what tests test adrenal sympathetic branch activity?