MattSavinar.netAntiobiotics, Depression, and Your Stomach
By Matt Savinar, posted 07/28/2008
Most of us westerners assumme feelings of depression, anxiety, or anger all originate in the mind/brain. Very little attention is given to the role of physiology or other body parts when it comes to emotional state. To illustrate, here is an excerpt from an old interview with Charles Poliquin on the role the stomach plays in one's mood and how corporate pharmaceuticals can impact its functioning:
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For example, I have this athlete; he had brain fog when he tried toplay in the StanleyCup. It turns out he had one of the highest doses of antibiotics, which destroyed his good bacteria, and by destroying the bacteria, it destroyed the neurotransmitters, which effected brain function. We treated him to support his neurotransmitters, and replace the good bacteria . . . 66% of the neurotransmitters are made in the gut lining, and 95% of the serotonin comes from the gut. That's where you get sayings like, "I’ve got a gut feeling that this is bad". The gut is your second brain. Some people get depression because they have a gut pathogen. Or lets say Candita, which is this type of yeast. They have mood swings and don’t understand why. You kill the Candita, and you don’t have mood swings anymore. Your neurotrans-mitters are made in the intestines. And 66% of the immune system is in the intestine. If you have a client that typically has a lot of cortisol, you’ll find that it compromises the immune system. Source
The connection between the brains lies at the heart of many woes, physical and psychiatric. Ailments like anxiety, depression, irritable bowel syndrome, ulcers and Parkinson's disease manifest symptoms at the brain and the gut level. "The majority of patients with anxiety and depression will also have alterations of their GI function," said Dr. Emeran Mayer, professor of medicine, physiology psychiatry at the University of California, Los Angele
According to Dr. Gershon, "when you make a drug to have psychic effects on the brain, it's very likely to have an effect on the gut that you didn't think about." He also believes that some drugs developed for the brain could have uses in the gut. For example, the gut is loaded with the neurotransmitter serotonin. According to Gershon, when pressure receptors in the gut's lining are stimulated, serotonin is released and starts the reflexive motion of peristalsis. A quarter of the people taking Prozac or similar antidepressants have gastrointestinal problems like nausea, diarrhea and constipation. These drugs act on serotonin, preventing its uptake by target cells so that it remains more abundant in the central nervous system.
Gershon also is conducting a study of the side effects of Prozac on the gut. Prozac in small doses can treat chronic constipation. Prozac in larger doses can cause constipation - where the colon actually freezes up. Moreover, because Prozac stimulates sensory nerves, it also can cause nausea.
Some antibiotics like erythromycin act on gut receptors to produce ascillations. People experience cramps and nausea. Drugs like morphine and heroin attach to the gut's opiate receptors, producing constipation. Both brains can be addicted to opiates.
Victims of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases suffer from constipation. The nerves in their gut are as sick as the nerve cells in their brains. Just as the central brain affects the gut, the gut's brain can talk back to the head.
The question has been raised: Why does the human gut contain receptors for benzodiazepine, a drug that relieves anxiety? This suggests that the body produces its own internal source of the drug. According to Dr. Anthony Basile, a neurochemist in the Neuroscience Laboratory at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, MD, an Italian scientist made a startling discovery. Patients with liver failure fall into a deep coma. The coma can be reversed, in minutes, by giving the patient a drug that blocks benzodiazepine. When the liver fails, substances usually broken down by the liver get to the brain. Some are bad, like ammonia and mercaptan, which are "smelly compounds that skunks spray on you," says Dr. Basile. But a series of compounds are also identical to benzodiazepine. "We don't know if they come from the gut itself, from bacteria in the gut or from food, but when the liver fails, the gut's benzodiazepine goes straight to the brain, knocking the patient unconscious, says Dr. Basile. Source
A good book on the role the stomach plays in regulating mood is The Second Brain by Dr. Gershon. Doing some googling, I came across a three-page article from 2005 in the NY Times on Dr. Gershon's work. An excerpt, emphasis added:
