I remember the first time I went to my doctor’s office and asked about how antidepressants would affect my body. Coming from a small town my doctor was familiar with my background and knew I was studying biology in college and therefore gave a very detailed answer to my question. She told me that SSRIs affect not only the brain but the digestive tract as well which I found very intriguing. My curiosity about this phenomenon has stayed with me today and I would like to further investigate this topic.
One study conducted by Karen-Anne Neufeld investigated the importance the vagus nerve has on the ability to reduce depressive behavior and its correlation with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI). The vagus nerve allows for parasympathetic communication between the enteric nervous system found in the digestive tract and the central nervous system (Medicine LibreTexts, 2020). Due to the high levels of serotonin found within the gut, researchers examined the therapeutic effect SSRIs had on gut-brain signaling via the vagal pathway. By studying mice, they found that blocking vagal signaling from the gut to the brain completely abolished the effects of SSRI’s as antidepressants. This study is significant as it suggests that mood disorders may be treated purely by vagal stimulation instead of by the ingestion of therapeutic agents. This study also sheds light on previous studies conducted that show the significance the vagus nerve has in treating intractable depression via electrical stimulation. (McVey Neufeld et al., 2019)
Though I’m sure not everyone would be eager for vagal nerve stimulation, there is a lot of potential for this innovative therapy. It could help people who struggle with taking medications every day or help those who have severe depression and have tried almost every SSRI out there. Personally, I would be willing to give this therapy a try if it had the potential to help long term. However, more research and development need to be done in order to make this method available to the public as a therapy for depression.
References
McVey Neufeld, K., Bienenstock, J., Bharwani, A., Champagne-Jorgensen, K., Mao, Y., West, C., Liu, Y., Surette, M. G., Kunze, W., & Forsythe, P. (2019). Oral selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors activate vagus nerve dependent gut-brain signalling. Scientific Reports, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-50807-8
Medicine LibreTexts. (2020, July 14). 22.2a: Enteric nervous
As someone who also suffers from depression I too have had a similar experience of worrying about the medication I put into my body everyday. However, This therapy would be something I am willing to try although I would feel more comfortable with more detailed research put into this and to compare and contrast with the long term effects in comparison to SSRIs. In order to do that though I know there needs to be more human trials done which may take some time.
ReplyDeleteWould you ever consider being in a human trial? I think I may as long as the evidence that it could work is presented to me clearly and if anything were to happen there would be a compensation.
Not only is there evidence of the vagus nerve in digestion playing a possible role in depression, there has been a lot of talk about the gut microbiome too. It has been believed that alteration in your gut microbiota may influence conditions like obesity, allergies, and psychiatric disorders. Depression and anxiety are often accompanied by changes in colonic motility, which alters the composition and stability of the gut microbiota (Lach, Schellekens, et al., 2018). More research is needed in understanding how gut microbes might influence peptide physiology.
ReplyDeleteWhen I took Endocrinology at CU Boulder, my professor did a lot of research in this field! (Shoutout to Dr. Chris Link) He mentioned that he always strives to include a lot of plant diversity in his diet to build that gut microbiome diversity, since it may play a role in health and disease.
References
Lach, G., Schellekens, H., Dinan, T. G., & Cryan, J. F. (2018). Anxiety, Depression, and the Microbiome: A Role for Gut Peptides. Neurotherapeutics : the journal of the American Society for Experimental NeuroTherapeutics, 15(1), 36–59. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13311-017-0585-0