Word: manically
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...study published last week focused on one 81-member clan. Fourteen members had been diagnosed with manic depression and another five with other mental disorders. Thanks to unusual cooperation from the family, the researchers were able to obtain blood from each member and then isolate DNA from each sample. Using so-called restriction enzymes, they "cut" the DNA into segments. When they compared gene segments from manic depressives with those from normal family members, they found a discrepancy in a region of chromosome 11. Their conclusion: a gene or group of genes in or near this region confers a predisposition...
Does the same genetic defect play a role in all manic depression? Not necessarily. Two studies also published in last week's Nature revealed no link between the chromosome 11 site and manic depression in six non-Amish families prone to the disease. Still, these findings do not undermine the important discovery of a genetic basis for the ailment. Instead, observes NIMH Psychiatrist Sevilla Detera-Wadleigh, who led one of the other studies, they suggest that more than one gene may be involved in manic depression...
...next step for scientists will be to identify the particular gene or genes responsible for manic depression. This will enable them to understand the biochemical basis for the disease, which could lead to better treatments. (The drug lithium carbonate is effective in 70% to 75% of cases.) It could also lead to tests for the diagnosis and identification of people at risk for bipolar disorder...
...benefit from her work. "Too often," she says, "personal embarrassment and social stigma are associated with an illness whose cause is beyond the control of the individual." That stigma should be lessened and more people should be encouraged to seek treatment now that scientists have confirmed the source of manic depression can indeed be im blut...
...study of Amish families with a history of manic depression provides the first genetic evidence that mental illness can be inherited...