Benefits Of Nicotine: Nicotine Shown To Reduce Symptoms of Schizophrenia

[deathmetal]

A meta-analysis of worldwide studies conducted in 2005 definitively showed what many doctors had been anecdotally noting for decades. Schizophrenia patients were much more likely to become heavy smokers than than those in the general population. In fact some studies found over 80 percent of those diagnosed with schizophrenia were smokers. There were many social and psychological hypotheses proposed to explain this strange anomaly, but none were ever sufficient. A new study published in Nature Medicine has not only revealed how smoking can normalize the impairments in brain activity associated with schizophrenia, but unlocks an entirely new field of drug research to combat the disease. The study expanded on the recent discovery of a genetic mutation, labelled CHRNA5, that was identified as being associated with the cognitive impairments seen in schizophrenic patients.
https://science.slashdot.org/story/17/01/25/2042206/nicotine-shown-to-reduce-symptoms-of-schizophrenia

 

[cosmicfolklore]

There is also a correlation with Alzheimer's disease and smokers using nicotine as a medium to self-medicate. There was a doctor on the radioshow a few years ago that wrote about this.
Also, when I first joined this forum, we had a few members that professed to be diagnosed with schizophrenia, and used smoking as a means of self-medicating. I miss their contributions, and I occasionally wonder what they are doing now.

 

[theloniousmonkfish]

It's also not been linked to cancer or cardiovascular disease and is a stimulant or sedative depending on dose.
From Wiki
"Nicotine is frequently used for its performance-enhancing effects on cognition, alertness, and focus."
If you're not pregnant you should get some nicotine in you, it's good stuff.

 

[mso489]

I'm sure the pharma companies have looked into this. No nicotine based therapeutic drugs for schizophrenia yet that I know about.
If you will forgive a brief vocabulary advisory, the term schizophrenic is often misused, though NOT in this post -- including by Ph.D. and M.D.'s in presentations! -- to mean "of two minds," as in split personality. This is an unknowingly cruel misrepresentation since people beset by schizophrenia are already facing a lot of rejection and misunderstanding. In any case, patients may experience auditory hallucinations (hear voices), confused thinking, and scrambled speech with chaotic imagery, but they are not two or more distinct personalities (multiple personality). So if you must use a mental illness image, say you are suffering from split personality on the subject. Or better yet, that serviceable old phrase, I'm of two minds. That'll do it.

 

[weezell]

The "VOICES" have been telling me this stuff for years... 8O