European Psychiatry Research

Introduction

  A great deal of brilliant research has been done in the Soviet Union and Russia. However, brilliant work has also been done in smaller countries such as Sweden and Germany and Norway. I can't do justice to all this work in one article, but rather will just give a taste of it. I happen to believe in alternative medicine and "integrative" medicine. In "integrative" medicine both orthodox medicine and nutritional alternatives are recognized.

Orlovskaia et al (1978)

  In 1978 this Russian group (Orlovskaia, Savulev, and Oifa) reported "acute swelling" of neurons in schizophrenia. This was seen with the electron microscope. Pathology was seen in the endoplasmic reticulum and in the mitochondria. The ER houses amino acids. The mitochondria houses amino acids, carbohydrates, and fat. Thus an error in amino acids would explain the results if too many of them were entering the cells.

  Pathology was seen in astrocytes and in neurons.

Romasenko et al (1969)

  This Russian group demonstrated a toxic factor in the blood serum of schizophrenics. They injected the serum of schizophrenics into white rats. The toxic factor was thought to be a blood protein. Pathology was seen in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and in the mitochondria.

Lozovsky (1959)

  Lozovsky used a culture of chicken fibroblasts as an assay. He found a "cytopathogenic action of the blood serum of schizophrenics". This confirmed previous (1956) work by S. Fedorov. Fedorov used mouse fibroblasts (L cells) as an assay.

  Lozovsky found that the beta globulin fraction of serum proteins was "the most active fraction". One way to explain this would be a small molecule with multiple binding sites. The primary binding site would be with the beta globulin.

Swedish Research

  The prestigious Karolinska Institute in Stockholm awards the Nobel Prizes in medicine.

  Borg et al (1987) of Stockholm reported muscle biopsy findings in schizophrenia. They examined 8 neuroleptic treated and 8 untreated schizophrenics. They found atrophic fibers, "moth eaten" fibers, glycogen droplets. etc. The glycogen droplets appear to indicate a metabolic error. The error appears to be a slowing of glucose metabolism. Previously the metabolic errors were thought to be largely restricted to the brain, making peripheral measures difficult.

  They found that these abnormalities "cannot be attributed to medication or drug abuse.

Borg et al

  They found vacuolated fibers, irregular formazan deposits, split fibers, etc. The results were the same in the two patient groups (treated and untreated). There was "an abundance of fat droplets". The scientists used both the light microscope and the electron microscope. With the electron microscope they found "an abundance of glycogen".

Conclusions

  The fat droplets seen are probably the result of a serious metabolic error. The same metabolic error most likely caused the glycogen deposits. This suggests a defect in glucose metabolism analogous to diabetes. However, in diabets there are no fat droplets. In diabetes fat is burned instead of glucose with disastrous results.

  The fat droplets could mean that the cells are overeating some macronutrients such as amino acids. If amino acids were burned for fuel instead of glucoes, this would explain the "abundant collections of glycogen".

  Whether the vacuoles are fat or amino acids or both was not clear from the Swedish article.

  I have data indicating that the main offending amino acid is tryptophan. In other words, tryptophan is flooding the cells. In view of the complexity of the data I have already presented, I will save this data for a future article. However, I would like to mention that this points towards an alternative medicine treatment. The treatment is a diet very low in tryptophan.

  Fruits are low in tryptophan, so fruits and berries are on the diet. These are largely water with some fiber and some fructose. Also they are often high in vitamin C.