Female curiosity

Sparky -

Dopamine is related more to Parkinson’s and to schizophrenia . Drugs for either disorder can push one toward the other extreme and produce symptoms of the other disorder.

Prozac decreases dopamine, I believe. It mostly raises serotonin. Decreased dopamine does indeed lead to compulsive disorders and depression, along with decreased serotonin. Wellbutrin, an antidepressant, raises both serotonin and dopamine.

Schizophrenia involves more than just high dopamine levels. Fish oil is actually beneficial in treating schizophrenia.

Prozac and the other SSRI’s affect seratonin but not dopamine. I think I once heard that Welbutrin affects both.

EDIT: What Zaneblue said.

Zaneblue,

I have up to this point stayed out of this conversation. However, I am now going to join it. Not ALL women like to be spanked. In the future, please state that some like it some don’t. Generalizing usually gets people in trouble.

Actually there’s some evidence that fluoxetine, unlike most SSRIs, increases levels of all three monoamines implicated in depression — serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine (e.g. ). Agreed with you, though, that serotonin is the main mediator of Prozac’s effects.

Sources? My understanding is the opposite — that an overly active dopaminergic system is associated with OCD. For example, greater dopamine transporter density is found in the brains of OCD patients than in controls (source) , and rats treated with dopamine agonists show behavior analogical to that of OCD sufferers (source ). More compellingly, some OCD patients (humans) treated with dopamine antagonists (i.e., antipsychotics used in treating schizophrenia) show symptom reduction (source 1 , source 2 ). And a small number of patients taking Parkinson’s drugs (dopamine agonists) begin to exhibit compulsive behavior such as gambling (source ).

Agreed that there’s some evidence linking depression to dopamine deficits. Problem, of course, is that drugs specifically and powerfully targeting dopamine are sometimes addictive for depressive patients (cf. self-medication with recreational drugs and alcohol). Wellbutrin, uniquely, as you note, may exert some of its psychological effects by affecting dopamine (as well as norephinephrine) neurotransmission (source ). It does not, however, significantly affect serotonin reuptake (source ).

Surprisingly, yes (source )!

Okay I know that was a pedantic post, comically over the top in citations :) . Just trying to demonstrate the usefulness of citing sources and kill some time until my chicken is out of the oven.

Dang!

PG, your thesis wouldn’t happen to be on biomedical therapies, would it?

I don’t see a source for the chicken.

No, Ramrod, not at all. Not trying to take this thread off topic, either, just demonstrating a useful tactic when making medical claims. I’ve found that a lot of arguments on this forum can be prevented by citing sources — not least because it indicates that the poster doesn’t expect to be trusted on his or her authority. I’m definitely not trying to pick on Zane; I think her vaginal enhancement (VE) stuff is exciting and completely new to a lot of us. I’ve learned LOTS from her posts.

:attention :lickin: :chicken: :chicken: :chicken:

That’s better.

Oh, of course not all women like to be spanked! I thought that would be obvious. Sorry, to rephrase—that’s why women who like to be spanked like to be spanked.

I met with Dr. Andrew Stoll at McLean Hospital when I was looking for a PI for my fish oil study. We discussed OCD and treatment with fish oil, he has worked with bipolar patients and fish oil source

Perhaps I misunderstood him. Will hunt around.

Damn, Zaneblue, I’m amazed by the number of disorders for which Omega-3s have been shown to be useful! Before you started posting the medical citations about fish oil, I would have dismissed such claims as panacea quackery. Although a lot of the research is still a bit preliminary (i.e., more replications needed), I am going to be more consistent in my fish oil supplementation now.

This must have been what he was talking about source

I assumed it was the dopamine effects of the fish oil helping but it was the neuronal membrane integrity instead—which I think must explain why it counterintuitively helps with schizophrenia.

When I’m wrong, I’m wrong. Dopamine not good for OCD. Thank you.

Oh there’s been plenty of replication. Here:

http://www.oilofpisces.com

If I were a bit more paranoid I’d suspect a big pharma conspiracy. Hell, big pharma came after me, tried to hush me up. They will have a hard time keeping the lid on the fact that omega-3 fatty acids work as an aphrodisiac for men and women.