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Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

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Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#181

Post by eurokc98 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #48

“This defines a completely novel strategy for medication development,” says lead author As someone with schizoaffective problems and raging ADHD, I find quotes like this acutely annoying. I've told every psychiatrist I'eve ever dealt with about the experiential costs/benefits of smoking (and consuming various other recreational drugs). They all nod sagely and say things like 'but smoking is bad' (no shit Sherlock!) w…

My 2C.. Our system doesn't provide the testing and data to make accurate, choices to build upon. We are at the mercy of over worked Drs, who look at basic tests, and often just have a minute to review at most. Our health is bound to the sheer luck of drawing a Dr who reads between the lines and can spot/sympathize/analyze our various issue(s).

My hypothesis is that there is too much variance in day to day life, activity, stress, food and liquid intake. In order to really test something I'd like to limit variables by using health apps for BP and HR, limiting diet by using something like Soylent for a month. That would establish the baseline test, then implement the change/drug/supplement, and test daily or weekly.

FWIW Yohimbe made me feel like shit. I would caution anyone looking at quick fixes without reading and setting up groundwork to accurately test yourself, even if its only anecdotal.

Why do I say we need to personally track things? There's a lot to learn. Is your system starved for, or already flooded with the element you're about to consume? Is your system lacking a precursor? Is your system failing downstream to break something else down which is causing a cascading build up? Everybody up-regulates and down-regulates stimulants, catacholamines, etc at different rates. Are you able to break it down from it's required co-factors upstream or downstream? As for Yohimbe, our adrenergic receptors are part of the puzzle there.

Many people have metabolic enzymatic variances, deficiencies, to full blown impairment and we all have changing levels of receptors. Some elements cross the blood brain barrier, some don't. Some people can benefit from a supplement, or an enzyme but to others it's actually detrimental since it may block another pathway. Even commonly known Dopamine and Serotonin require various ingredients that may or may not be present in our systems such as dopamine beta hydroxylase, LDopa, BH4, etc. Various receptor density in any area can impact both the uptake and down regulation, while cascading their impact neighboring systems.

We as humans, are all very different on what works, and what doesn't. It sucks, and it's amazing.

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#182

Post by anigbrowl »

agentgt wrote: post #122
anigbrowl wrote: post #48

“This defines a completely novel strategy for medication development,” says lead author As someone with schizoaffective problems and raging ADHD, I find quotes like this acutely annoying. I've told every psychiatrist I'eve ever dealt with about the experiential costs/benefits of smoking (and consuming various other recreational drugs). They all nod sagely and say things like 'but smoking is bad' (no shit Sherlock!) w…

I have never been addicted to cigarettes and do not smoke but I do chew nicotine gum all the time for ADD (and yes there is a difference between ADHD and ADD). I took me a while to figure out that nicotine is a superior stimulant over caffeine, adderall, ritalin and even chocolate extract (albeit chocolate was surprisingly effective). The big plus with nicotine is that it doesn't have the after downer that the above…

Before I quit I used patches for a while with only minor side-effects - slight upset stomach and night sweats, which are certainly no worse than any of the various amphetamine analogs I've been prescribed. I quit nicotine completely though because I always went back to smoking due to the extremely fast uptake. I'm not sure about whether I want to get back on it, or whether it would even work any more.

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#183

Post by surement »

abandonliberty wrote: post #66
codr4life wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit. Nicotine in itself doesn't harm anyone, that's completely made up. On the contrary, a lot of people would be helped by getting more Nicotine into their system, preferably from eating veggies rather than smoking it.

The burden of proof is on you here. If you're going to argue something at odds with the medical profession and most published research, you better have some solid facts from reliable sources.

Keep in mind that most of this published research is about smoking cigarettes (using "nicotine" as a metonymy).

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#184

Post by matthewbauer »

tcj_phx wrote: post #102
lawpoop wrote: post #68

I'm convinced that if it were suddenly discovered today, nicotine would be hailed as a miracle drug. It has several properties. It's both a stimulant and a relaxant. It helps you focus without burning out your neurons and inducing psychosis like amphetamines. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine#Psychoactive_effects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine#Enhancing_performance While there is some risk to it, the act…

> Also, there are several MAOIs in tobacco smoke. MAOIs are used as last-line anti-depressants, because of their side-effects when taken in large doses. But with tobacco products, a user basically gets a tritrateable MAOI. Reversible MAOIs are safer than the irreversible ones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoamine_oxidase_inhibitor#Re... There were some articles in the Boston Globe in 2000 that pointed out that the…

I've always wondered: how do they establish a drug causes suicide? I mean they're not literally giving people suicidal thoughts. How do they make people more prone to suicide?

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#185

Post by evincarofautumn »

narrator wrote: post #175
qrybam wrote: post #38

Tangential self experimentation anecdote: I was intrigued by reports that nicotine can improve cognition in otherwise healthy people so I read through as many studies/articles I could find online. After deciding that I'd done enough research I took the plunge and began self experimenting with 2mg gum. I took it daily throughout the day at regular-ish intervals for around 2-3 months. The affects I experienced were as…

Nicotine also accelerates cancer growth. Specifically, nicotinic acetylcholine receptor overstimulation is associated with growth and metastasis of pancreatic cancer [1]. Thus, I'd say that nicotine is unhealthy for long-term chronic use. Caffeine, on the other hand, has shown long-term health benefits in studies.[2] [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26264026 [2] http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/16/14285210/coffe…

Nicotine also triggers a spike in blood sugar, which isn’t great for pancreatic health either.

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#186

Post by digler999 »

tomcam wrote: post #64
anigbrowl wrote: post #48

“This defines a completely novel strategy for medication development,” says lead author As someone with schizoaffective problems and raging ADHD, I find quotes like this acutely annoying. I've told every psychiatrist I'eve ever dealt with about the experiential costs/benefits of smoking (and consuming various other recreational drugs). They all nod sagely and say things like 'but smoking is bad' (no shit Sherlock!) w…

Fascinating story. Sorry it has become tougher since quitting--a near Sophie's Choice predicament. I find M.D.'s to be alarmingly low in intellectual curiosity.

The stakes are pretty high to get "curious" with applying medical treatments. So it's not surprising that the field selects (or teaches) them to dampen their curiosity. There's malady A whose treatment options are {a,b,c..}. The algorithm of treating the malady doesn't align itself with being curious. From an outsider, it seems like the difficulty in being an MD lies in knowing all the maladies and correctly applying their respective treatments (while not making mistakes).

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#187

Post by anigbrowl »

eurokc98 wrote: post #181
anigbrowl wrote: post #48

“This defines a completely novel strategy for medication development,” says lead author As someone with schizoaffective problems and raging ADHD, I find quotes like this acutely annoying. I've told every psychiatrist I'eve ever dealt with about the experiential costs/benefits of smoking (and consuming various other recreational drugs). They all nod sagely and say things like 'but smoking is bad' (no shit Sherlock!) w…

My 2C.. Our system doesn't provide the testing and data to make accurate, choices to build upon. We are at the mercy of over worked Drs, who look at basic tests, and often just have a minute to review at most. Our health is bound to the sheer luck of drawing a Dr who reads between the lines and can spot/sympathize/analyze our various issue(s). My hypothesis is that there is too much variance in day to day life, activ…

All very good points. I do feel that part of the problem is attitudinal - I am from Europe and have been to psychiatrists in 2 countries with public health systems as well as privately here (where I paid out of pocket without even asking for a discount).

Of course psychiatrists have a difficult job - there isn't a simple blood test for many mental conditions, for example, so starting out by compiling checklists is almost unavoidable. But none of the psychiatrists whose care I've ever been under (8 or 9 I think) has ever done so much as a blood draw or discussed even the possibility of doing a brain scan, or well, anything.

At best I've gotten confirmation for the research I did on the internet or in the library, and while I'm sure it's very annoying to have patients with no medical degree coming in and asking half-baked questions about this or that study, I don't feel very sympathetic considering that it's really the psychiatrist's job to apprise the patient of those options, or at least to take the patients' reports and suggestions seriously and work wit the information available.

While I'm (obviously) pissed off about all this, at the same time I consider myself very lucky - I live in the age of the internet and despite having a lot of mental problems I'm also smart and discriminating so at least I'm able to exert some influence over my own treatment. Most people with mental illness enjoy no such advantages. My best friend suffered a psychotic break about a year ago and was institutionalized for most of a month, right here in the Bay Area. Conditions were better than a jail, but not much. I was especially struck by the dire low quality of the food; how can you expect people to get better when their nutrition is such an obviously low priority?

I'm going to shut up now - as you can see I have a vested interest in this topic and the inequities anger me so much that it doesn't make for good conversation. Apologies to my fellow HNers who may have found this difficult to read.

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#188

Post by lawpoop »

matthewbauer wrote: post #184
tcj_phx wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, there are several MAOIs in tobacco smoke. MAOIs are used as last-line anti-depressants, because of their side-effects when taken in large doses. But with tobacco products, a user basically gets a tritrateable MAOI. Reversible MAOIs are safer than the irreversible ones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoamine_oxidase_inhibitor#Re... There were some articles in the Boston Globe in 2000 that pointed out that the…

I've always wondered: how do they establish a drug causes suicide? I mean they're not literally giving people suicidal thoughts. How do they make people more prone to suicide?

Reports of users. If users report suicidal thoughts during tests and in "the field", then the drug is said to be connected to suicides when users of it end up offing themselves.

The official term is "increased risk of suicide", with the reasoning being suicidal thoughts is a necessary precursor to suicide. But nobody's death certificate actually says that a prescription drug was the cause of death, when it was a suicide.

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#189

Post by rickycook »

brianpgordon wrote: post #97
samx18 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IMO Vaping is a far safer alternative to smoking for getting nicotine.

True, but being healthier than smoking is not exactly a high bar. If you must take nicotine as a nootropic, take it orally. Vaping is much more addictive than letting a 2mg lozenge slowly dissolve. Relative addictiveness of different ROAs is directly correlated with how quickly the drug takes effect, and when you vape the nicotine hits your bloodstream within seconds. Also I can't mention enough that if you take an M…

part of the problem with this is that, from what i've heard, the actual action of putting the cigarette to your mouth is addictive as well. in many cases, people will advise smokers to do the action with a pen or some such to help with that. i can only imagine that vaping would be even closer, and help even more

Re: Nicotine Normalizes Brain Activity Deficits That Are Key to Schizophrenia

#190

Post by anigbrowl »

digler999 wrote: post #186
tomcam wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fascinating story. Sorry it has become tougher since quitting--a near Sophie's Choice predicament. I find M.D.'s to be alarmingly low in intellectual curiosity.

The stakes are pretty high to get "curious" with applying medical treatments. So it's not surprising that the field selects (or teaches) them to dampen their curiosity. There's malady A whose treatment options are {a,b,c..}. The algorithm of treating the malady doesn't align itself with being curious. From an outsider, it seems like the difficulty in being an MD lies in knowing all the maladies and correctly applying…

You make an excellent point, but usually I can have a good conversation with a doctor about a physical malady, and once they work out that I'm not a hypochondriac or trying to impress them consultations have been very productive. I picked my last psychiatrist partly because he had a decent publishing record and I thought he would have some academic curiosity - and for all I know maybe he does, but he doesn't share it with his patients :)
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