Purposeful Activity in Psychiatric Rehabilitation: Is Neurogenesis a Key Player?

Abstract

Adult neurogenesis, defined as the generation of new neurons in adulthood, has been a fascinating discovery in neuroscience, as the continuously replenishing neuronal population provides a new perspective to understand neuroplasticity. Besides maintaining normal physiological function, neurogenesis also plays a key role in pathophysiology and symptomatology for psychiatric conditions. In the past decades, extensive effort has been spent on the understanding of the functional significance of neurogenesis in psychiatric conditions, mechanisms of pharmacological treatment, and discovery of novel drug candidates for different conditions. In a clinical situation, however, long-term rehabilitation treatment, in which occupational therapy is the key discipline, is a valuable, economical, and commonly used treatment alternative to psychotropic medications. Surprisingly, comparatively few studies have investigated the biological and neurogenic effects of different psychiatric rehabilitative treatments. To address the possible linkage between psychiatric rehabilitation and neurogenesis, this review discusses the role of neurogenesis in schizophrenia, major depression, and anxiety disorders. The review also discusses the potential neurogenic effect of currently used psychiatric rehabilitation treatments. With a better understanding of the biological effect of psychiatric rehabilitation methods and future translational studies, it is hoped that the therapeutic effect of psychiatric rehabilitation methods could be explained with a novel perspective. Furthermore, this knowledge will benefit future formulation of treatment methods, especially purposeful activities in occupational therapy, for the treatment of psychiatric disorders.

Interaction Effect of Social Isolation and High Dose Corticosteroid on Neurogenesis and Emotional Behavior

“…Social isolation is one of the environmental factors that exacerbate depression (Sharp and Lipsky, 2002 ). This was supported by a long-term follow-up study in which patients with social isolation demonstrated a high risk of recurrent depressive episodes (Riise and Lund, 2001 ), while social interaction was reported to facilitate recovery from depression (Cheung et al, 2016 ). For rodents, being a social species, social isolation is regarded as a potent stressor for inducing physiological changes which include alterations in learning, aggression and reduced body weight (Beery and Kaufer, 2015 ).…”

What can traditional Chinese medicine do for adult neurogenesis?

“…Adult neurogenesis abnormalities play an important role in a variety of neurodegenerative disorders, such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Huntington’s disease (HD), and Parkinson’s disease (PD) ( Winner and Winkler, 2015 ; Horgusluoglu et al, 2017 ; Berger et al, 2020 ). In addition, adult neurogenesis is associated with emotional illnesses, such as depression ( Sahay and Hen, 2007 ; Vaidya et al, 2007 ; Berger et al, 2020 ) and anxiety ( Cheung et al, 2016 ; Toda and Gage, 2018 ). Stress ( Odaka et al, 2017 ; Schoenfeld et al, 2017 ) and stroke ( Rahman et al, 2021 ) are also associated with abnormal adult neurogenesis.…”

Impact of Psychosocial Occupational Therapy Combined with Anodal Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation to the Left Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex on the Cognitive Performance of Patients with Schizophrenia: A Randomized Controlled Trial

“…Investigations indicated that CRT could decrease frontal lobe dysfunctions and promote related cognitive functions in patients with schizophrenia. Psychiatric rehabilitation treatments, such as cognitive tasks, can lead to neurogenesis and the amelioration of various brain functions (Cheung et al, 2016).…”