Depression

Depression can be a pernicious life threatening illness that is often a complex mixture of internal and external factors. Sufferers may fall into a pattern of recurrence, with stages of partial remission and relapse. There have been a multitude of new findings in the field of Depression research that make the monoamine theory woefully out of date. Traditionally depression was thought to arise from deranged neurotransmitter systems (monoamine theory) such as serotonin, dopamine etc, however, depression has components of inflammation, immune dysfunction and disordered energetics which may precede these changes. By simply focusing on the level of neurotransmitters symptom resolution is possible but underlying issues remain untreated, leading to a partial response or relapse/reoccurrence.

Recent findings:

• Increased levels of DNA damage, repair and breaks
• Increased levels of oxidative stress, inducing cellular damage
• Increased levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines, immune mediated dysfunction
• Abnormal levels of monoamines (serotonin, glutamate etc)
• Deficient levels of particular nutrients such as magnesium
• Elevated levels of homo-cysteine
• Neuro inflammation

Depressive illness is one of the most well researched conditions in existence, without addressing all the factors that can precipitate and perpetuate the illness, full symptom resolution is difficult to achieve.