How Eating Mushrooms Help Treating Depression

What is depression-?

1. Severe despondency and dejection, accompanied by feelings of hopelessness and inadequacy.

2. A condition of mental disturbance, typically with lack of energy and difficulty in maintaining concentration or interest in life.

Mushrooms have been popular for a long time, with cave paintings dating back to Mesolithic era (14,000 to 5000 BC) showing pictures of the fungus. Now research is starting to show that they have an anti-depressive effect similar to drugs like Prozac, but with additional mind opening benefits.

David Nutt of Imperial College London, who gave a briefing about the studies on Monday

said:"Psychedelics are thought of as 'mind-expanding' drugs so it has commonly been assumed that they work by increasing brain activity ... But, surprisingly, we found that psilocybin actually caused activity to decrease in areas that have the densest connections with other areas.” The first study has been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) journal. Researchers enrolled 30 volunteers who had psilocybin infused into their blood while they were inside magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners; these scanners measure changes in brain activity. The second study, which will be published in the British Journal of Psychiatry this week, had the 10 volunteers experiencing enhanced recollections of personal memories from psilocybin.

Robin Carhart Harris from Imperial's department of medicine, and who worked on both studies, commented that psilocybin could be useful as an addition to psychotherapy:

"We're not saying go out there and eat magic mushrooms ... But... this drug has such a fundamental impact on the brain that it's got to be meaningful ... it's got to be telling us something about how the brain works. "The use of psychedelic drugs is nothing new with writers such as Timothy Leary and Aldus Huxley, proclaiming the wonderful mind opening qualities of LSD in the early 1960s. Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, also proclaimed that LSD was one of the most wonderful things he had done in his life, but the federal government finds the effects of Psilocybin and other psychedelics unenlightening, and has classified Psilocybin as a Schedule 1 controlled substance, with no currently accepted medical use.

Scientists say that two key areas of the brain are altered by the drug. One called the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and another called the posterior cingulated cortex (PCC), are not well understood, but the PCC is thought by many to have a role in consciousness and self-identity, while the mPFC is known to be hyperactive in people with depression. Drugs such as Prozac and other approaches like cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and deep brain stimulation also appear to suppress mPFC activity.

Psilocybin seems to work by reducing blood flow in the hypothalamus, which is a part of the brain where people who suffer from a condition known as cluster headaches often have increased blood flow. This could go a long way to explaining why some cluster headache sufferers have said their symptoms improved after taking the psychedelic drug.

There have been only a few experiments and studies of psychedelic drugs since the 1960s and 70s, when they were newly discovered and in vogue, but during the last three decades with them being classified as controlled substances, little investigation was done

Researchers say they are cautiously optimistic, but clearly this is not a therapy that is going to go mainstream any time soon, and people should be cautious of trying to use the mushrooms themselves, not least because they are a variety of similar looking types that can be poisonous and cause anything from a bad stomach to extreme toxicity symptoms. (Source-Prozac Weekly)

Free tips to deals with Depression in 2012

This is my first blog of 2012 on health. First I want to wish my all blog readers a happy and healthy 2012.

In this blog you will find What Causes Depression and how to deal.

There are two main categories of risks that can contribute to depression—those that you can't change, and those that you can.

Uncontrollable Risk Factors

These variables are out of your control. Although you can't do anything to change them, it's important to know whether you fall into any of these higher-risk categories.

Family history

 Depression appears to have a genetic component. You are more likely to experience depression if one of your parents also suffered from depression. If both parents had depression, your risk of developing it is twice as high.

Gender

Women are twice as likely to experience depression as men. Experts believe this is due to fluctuating hormone levels that women experience throughout life.

Age

While you may think that the risk of developing depression increases with age, that's not the always the case. In fact, studies show that the elderly are more likely to be happy and content with their lives than their younger counterparts. Depression can occur at any age (even in children), but it is most common in people between the ages of 24 and 44.

Your health history.

Chronic health conditions such as disability, heart disease, hypothyroidism, stroke, cancer, diabetes, multiple sclerosis (MS), and Parkinson’s disease can lead to depression. A history of depression also increases your risk for future episodes.

Psychosocial factors.

 Depression is more common in people who have a history of trauma, abuse (sexual, physical or emotional), neglect, alcoholism, drug addiction, and insufficient family structure.

Environmental factors.

Chronic depression occurs more often in people who live in areas afflicted with war, natural disasters, and poverty. Seasonal depression is most common in high latitudes with extreme seasonal changes.

Life changes

The loss of a loved one, conflicts with others, losing or starting a new job, the end of a relationship, retirement, moving to a new city and more—many life events can trigger depressive episodes.

In second part you find how to deals with...