http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. Multiple genes contribute to risk for schizophrenia and appear to function in pathways related to transmission of signals in the brain and immunity, according to an international study led by Virginia Commonwealth University School of Pharmacy researchers. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-multiple-genes-robustly-contribute-schizophrenia.html Genetics Tue, 09 Apr 2013 16:48:25 EST news284744896 Schizophrenia patients experiencing relapse are 29 times more likely than healthy individuals to have a urinary tract infection, researchers report. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-urinary-tract-infections-schizophrenia-relapse.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 03 Apr 2013 11:06:33 EST news284205985 Cognitive impairments are disabling for individuals with schizophrenia, and no satisfactory treatments currently exist. These impairments affect a wide range of cognition, including memory, attention, verbal and motor skills, and IQ. They appear in the earliest stages of the disease and disrupt or even prevent normal day-to-day functioning. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-brain-magnetic-memory-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 12 Mar 2013 12:03:32 EST news282308606 A study of eye movements in schizophrenia patients provides new evidence of impaired reading fluency in individuals with the mental illness. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-eye-movements-reveal-impaired-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 19 Feb 2013 10:50:03 EST news280489170 Researchers at the Institute for Comprehensive Medical Science, Fujita Health University and the National Institute for Physiological Sciences, Japan, along with colleagues from 9 other institutions, have identified an exceptional mouse model of schizophrenia. After screening over 160 mutant mouse strains with a systematic battery of behavioral tests, they identified a mutant mouse lacking the Schnurri-2 protein (Shn-2 KO) that exhibits behavioral deficits and other brain features consistent with schizophrenia. Shn-2 is an NF-kappaB site-binding protein that binds enhancers of major histocompatibility complex class I genes and inflammatory cytokines, which harbor common variant single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with schizophrenia. The Shn-2 KO mice display behavioral abnormalities that resemble the symptoms of human schizophrenia, including working memory deficits, impaired nest building behavior (a measure of self-neglect), decreased social behaviors, and anhedonia (loss of the ability to experience pleasure). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-induction-mild-inflammation-cognitive-deficits.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 06 Feb 2013 09:50:11 EST news279366453 A new study, to be published in the Feb. 7, 2013 issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics, expands and deepens the biological and genetic links between cardiovascular disease and schizophrenia. Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of premature death among schizophrenia patients, who die from heart and blood vessel disorders at a rate double that of persons without the mental disorder. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-links-schizophrenia-cardiovascular-disease.html Genetics Thu, 31 Jan 2013 12:00:09 EST news278854042 Magnetic fields produced by the naturally occurring electrical currents in the brain could potentially be used as an objective test for schizophrenia and help to better understand the disease, according to new research published today. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-brain-insight-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 30 Jan 2013 19:00:07 EST news278790004 Choline, an essential nutrient similar to the B vitamin and found in foods such as liver, muscle meats, fish, nuts and eggs, when given as a dietary supplement in the last two trimesters of pregnancy and in early infancy, is showing a lower rate of physiological schizophrenic risk factors in infants 33 days old. The study breaks new ground both in its potentially therapeutic findings and in its strategy to target markers of schizophrenia long before the illness itself actually appears. Choline is also being studied for potential benefits in liver disease, including chronic hepatitis and cirrhosis, depression, memory loss, Alzheimer's disease and dementia, and certain types of seizures. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-choline-supplementation-pregnancy-approach-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 15 Jan 2013 16:57:59 EST news277491474 Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and the VA San Diego Healthcare System have found that deficiencies in the neural processing of simple auditory tones can evolve into a cascade of dysfunctional information processing across wide swaths of the brain in patients with schizophrenia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-schizophrenia-patients-auditory-cues-bigger.html Neuroscience Fri, 30 Nov 2012 16:02:00 EST news273513710 Neuroscientists studying the link between poor sleep and schizophrenia have found that irregular sleep patterns and desynchronised brain activity during sleep could trigger some of the disease's symptoms. The findings, published in the journal Neuron, suggest that these prolonged disturbances might be a cause and not just a consequence of the disorder's debilitating effects. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-poor-contribute-symptoms-schizophrenia.html Neuroscience Wed, 14 Nov 2012 13:30:55 EST news272122233 Researchers at the University of Bergen in Norway have found new support for their theory that cannabis use causes a temporary cognitive breakdown in non-psychotic individuals, leading to long-term psychosis. In an fMRI study published this week in Frontiers in Psychiatry, researchers found a different brain activity pattern in schizophrenia patients with previous cannabis use than in schizophrenic patients without prior cannabis use. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-cannabis-mimics-cognitive-weakness-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Fri, 02 Nov 2012 12:09:42 EST news271076971 A new study reinforces the finding that a region of the genome involved in immune system function, called the major histocompatibility complex (MHC), is involved in the genetic susceptibility to schizophrenia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-immune-dysfunction-contribute-schizophrenia.html Genetics Wed, 10 Oct 2012 13:30:01 EST news269093715 Blood levels of a protein that helps regulate inflammation may also serve as a red flag for relapse in some schizophrenia patients, researchers said. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-pursue-red-flag-schizophrenia-relapse.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Mon, 06 Aug 2012 13:16:02 EST news263477736 In the current online issue of PLoS ONE, researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine say they have identified a set of laboratory-based biomarkers that can be useful for understanding brain-based abnormalities in schizophrenia. The measurements, known as endophenotypes, could ultimately be a boon to clinicians who sometimes struggle to recognize and treat the complex and confounding mental disorder. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-07-biomarkers-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 11 Jul 2012 13:30:54 EST news261232247 (HealthDay) -- A new study finds that antipsychotic drugs can help many people with schizophrenia, cutting patients' risk of relapse by 60 percent. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-antipsychotics-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Thu, 03 May 2012 15:20:03 EST news255274744 The use of weak electrical currents to stimulate the brain is a safe treatment for depression and might even improve attention and reduce pain elsewhere in the body, an Australian study has found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-electrical-brain-safe-treatment-fordepression.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 06 Mar 2012 08:50:02 EST news250245780 A pioneering new study finds that a specific type of computerized cognitive training can lead to significant neural and behavioral improvements in individuals with schizophrenia. The research, published by Cell Press in the February 23 issue of the journal Neuron, reveals that 16 weeks of intensive cognitive training is also associated with improved social functioning several months later and may have far-reaching implications for improving the quality of life for patients suffering from neuropsychiatric illness. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-reality-brain-behavior-schizophrenia.html Neuroscience Wed, 22 Feb 2012 13:01:41 EST news249138056 Schizophrenia is a mental illness that seriously affects social interaction. Recent studies have shown that people with schizophrenia have difficulty in interpreting others' intentions. One of the causes has just been identified by researchers at the Centre de Recherches Cerveau et Cognition (France) and the Centre de Neuroscience Cognitive de Lyon (France). They showed that schizophrenic patients use past experience wrongly when trying to anticipate the intentions of others. These results are published in the online version of the journal Brain. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-schizophrenia-doesnt-social-interaction.html Neuroscience Tue, 27 Dec 2011 07:57:07 EST news244194991 (Medical Xpress) -- A study of schizophrenia patients has found profound disruptions in their sleep patterns, with half also having irregular body clocks that are out of synch with the pattern of night and day. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-problems-important-schizophrenia.html Psychology & Psychiatry Thu, 22 Dec 2011 06:52:41 EST news243759108 Broad sweeps of the human genome have exposed genetic mutations that boost the risk of the devastating yet baffling diseases of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, according to two studies published Sunday. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-genes-linked-schizophrenia-bipolar-disorder.html Genetics Sun, 18 Sep 2011 13:32:21 EST news235571526