Aditi Mishra
Remedial for Quiz 3
In 1949, with the publication of
John Cade, the world came to know about Lithium as a treatment method of bipolar
disorder. Bipolar disorder is a
brain disorder that
causes unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, and the ability to
carry out day-to-day tasks. A lot of treatments were and are available but
lithium, the third smallest atom, has a lot of physiological effects and is
used for therapeutic treatments. Martin Alda from the Psychology department,
Dalhousie University, in his article ‘Lithium in the treatment of bipolar
disorder: Pharmacology and pharmacogenetics’, has extensively talked about
lithium’s mechanisms, its uses and its advantages and disadvantages.
Lithium is mostly used to cure bipolar
disorder. There have been controversies attached to the use of the element to
treat mania and depression. Yet, it has been extensively used since the 19th
century. This element has a lot of pharmacological effects on multiple signaling
pathways. The article explicitly gives numerous clinical factors of lithium
such as: reduces risks of suicide, its prophylactic treatment runs in families,
for a full clinical effect the plasma levels needed by a patient should be 0.6
and 1.0 mmol/L, works best in patients with classical features of BD and is
neuro protective in vitro and likely in vivo.
For some researchers the effects of
lithium are ambiguous and don’t give clear evidence on how the treatment works.
But there are some strong facts which boost the psychologists on using lithium
to treat bipolar disorder. Initial research in BD suggested an increased residual
in sodium during episodes of depression and mania which then come to a state of
normalization during the course of the patient’s lithium treatment. One
question that comes to mind is the unique function of lithium that enables it
to treat BD. Lithium, as researchers measured its neuronal excitability which
showed that lithium reduced the resting membrane potential and reduced neuronal
excitability.
Despite lithium being universally
accepted as a treatment to BD, its use as been significantly decreasing. The main
reason is its toxicity and side effects. The side effects that prove hazardous
to the patients are nausea, excessive urination, diarrhea and tremors. These
side effects can be reduced by balancing the levels of lithium in the therapy.
In contrast, side effects like weight gain and cognitive impairment from
lithium is more distressing and very difficult to manage. Not only this, but
lithium also does affect the kidneys, the thyroid glands and the parathyroid
glands which in turn causes a lot of health issues to the patients.
Researchers thus have formulated
some methods through which the side effects can be monitored and controlled. These
methods are: watchful waiting, lower dose, alter time of medication administration,
changing to a different lithium formulation, antidotes for specific side
effects, and change medication to a different mood stabilizer.Though
bipolar disorder can be treated with therapies such as CBT, Behaviour therapy
and psychotherapy, medications such as SSRIs can also come into better use. Yet,
the whole usage of lithium is a milestone in psychopathology and creates new
areas in the discovery of various elements that can be used to treat psychological
disorders
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