Posted by Chairman_MAO on May 6, 2005, at 11:08:52
In reply to is lowering seizure threshold theraputic, posted by linkadge on April 30, 2005, at 22:57:40
It is not that lowering the seizure threshold is therapeutic, it's that increased activity in the CNS in different places can be therapeutic. Increased CNS activity pretty much equates with a lowered seizure threshold, given that a seizure is just way too much activity such that it gets out of control.
ECT works purportedly because the specific types of convulsions induce a complex neuroendocrinological cascade that results in the therapeutic effect. It is not the convulsion per se that is therapeutic, it is the result of it.
Strychnine in extremely low doses is a smart drug. Today, one of the drugs that is used as a standard "reference" convulsant in animal studies used to be a "tonic" marketed to the elderly for vitality ("metrazol" or something, I think).
In summary, a lowered seizure threshold is a correlate, not the cause, of the therapeutic effect.
poster:Chairman_MAO
thread:491099
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050504/msgs/494509.html