Neuropsychiatric Disease and &lt;i&gt;Toxoplasma gondii&lt;/i&gt; Infection

Henriquez, S.A.; Brett, Ros R.; Alexander, James; Pratt, Judith A.; Roberts, Craig W.

doi:10.1159/000180267

Cited by 172 publications

(159 citation statements)

References 225 publications

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“…Behavioral changes attributed to infection due to T. gondii may be due to the parasite itself, which causes infection with nerve damage. IFN-γ, the main responsible cytokine for immunological defense against T. gondii is essential in all infected tissues, including the central nervous system (13)(14)(15)(16)(17). The biosynthesis of dopamine and/or serotonin could be directly affected by aromatic amino acid hydroxylases in T. gondii genome.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Increase of dopamine in the brains of infected patients can be associated with the missing link between toxoplasmosis and mental disorders (15,18). Although, latent cases treated as asymptomatic and clinically unimportant by medical professionals, results of animal studies and recent studies of personality profiles, behavior, and psychomotor performance have led to reconsider T. gondii infection as a risk factor for the development of some neuropsychiatric disorders, including schizophrenia, parkinson disease (PD) and alzheimer's disease (AD) (10,13,18,19).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Seroprevalence of Toxoplasma gondii Infection in Patients with Alzheimer’s Disease

Rashno

Fallahi

Kheirandish

et al. 2016

Arch Clin Infect Dis

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Background: Toxoplasmosis is one of the most important diseases in humans and animals. Almost one-third of the human population around the world is infected with toxoplasmosis. The agent of this parasitic disease is a protozoan called Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii) that causes encephalitis in people with suppressed immune systems and abortion, mental retardation and chorioretinitis in the fetus. Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most important neurodegenerative disease. Objectives: Due to the high prevalence of toxoplasmosis in Iran and evidence on its impact on neurodegenerative diseases, this study was performed to evaluate the T. gondii infection in patients with AD. Patients and Methods:In this case-control study, after selection of alzheimer's patients (APs) referred to Imam Reza psychiatric hospital of Khorramabad, west of Iran, and healthy controls (each group consisted of 87 individuals), using the convenience sampling method and under the supervision of a neurologist, blood samples were taken during July 2014 and January 2015. The collected samples were transferred to the research laboratory of parasitology under cold chain storage and then, the serum samples were separated by centrifugation and were frozen at -20°C until use. The T. gondii IgM and IgG specific antibodies were assessed in serum samples using commercial Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) kits. Results: The overall prevalence of T. gondii infection in patients with AD and the control group, using ELISA assay, was obtained as 66.6% (58/87) and 56.32% (49/87), respectively (P = 0.99). In this study, there was no significant association between T. gondii infection and AD. On the other hand, no statistically significant difference was observed between the two groups in terms of infection with T. gondii (P = 0.99). Conclusions: Higher prevalence of T. gondii in patients with AD compared to controls showed the possible impact of this parasite in AD, which may exacerbate symptoms, and this requires special attention of specialists and patient families.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seroprevalence of Toxoplasma gondii Infection in Patients with Alzheimer’s Disease

Rashno

Fallahi

Kheirandish

et al. 2016

Arch Clin Infect Dis

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“…gondii and schizophrenia relations have been linked in many studies [63], and generally it's accepted that T. gondii triggers psychiatric disorders via affecting neurotransmitter secretion [54]. It is known that the T. gondii genome contains two aromatic amino acid hydroxylases that can directly affect dopamine and/or serotonin biosynthesis [64]. It is unclear how T. gondii increased dopamine levels; however, the dopamine is released during inflammation due to the increase of cytokines such as interleukin-2 (IL-2) [65,66].…”

Section: Schizophrenia and Toxoplasmosismentioning

confidence: 99%

Toxoplasmosis and Public Health Genomics

Oymak¹,

Merve²,

Sevilay³

et al. 2017

Toxoplasmosis

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Toxoplasma gondii infection generally causes flu-like symptoms in healthy individuals; however, immunosuppression of the infected individual causes reactivation of the pathogen to its active form and relapse of the toxoplasmosis. Today it is known that toxoplasmosis triggers psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia as well as behavioral changes such as suicide attempts. Although dermatological manifestations are very rare, the dermatological lesions are not unique. In addition, previous toxoplasma infection also causes congenital infections because of placental infection and causes birth defects and spontaneous abortion. T. gondii strains are mainly divided into three main clonal lineages, yet higher recombination rate causes unusual population structure and heterogeneous distribution of the pathogen. Both genetic variations, of the pathogen and the patients, are important for virulence property and success of the therapies. The scientist focuses on the genetic variations of the pathogens and individuals to achieve effective treatment and developed tailor-made medicines. Thus, understanding the molecular basis of the disease and the link of molecular mechanism with host immunity is important to fully know the disease and related disorders. In this chapter, we would like to evaluate the current knowledge on genetic, molecular characteristics of toxoplasmosis in view of public health genomics.

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“…In chronic toxoplasmosis, T. gondii forms cysts that can be located in various anatomical sites including the brain. Stimulation of the immune response has also been associated with mood and behavioral alterations in humans [47].…”

Section: Toxoplasmosismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, the ability of T. gondii to manipulate the behaviour of infected mice and rats and alter personality attributes of humans has been reported [47]. T. gondii can alter the Lister-hooded laboratory rats' perception of predation risk turning their innate aversion into a suicidal feline attraction.…”

Section: Toxoplasmosismentioning

confidence: 99%

Psychiatric Aspects of Infectious Diseases

Mufaddel¹,

Omer²,

Salem³

2014

OJPsych

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Psychiatric symptoms can be associated with several systemic and central nervous system infections and they can be the initial presenting symptoms, occurring in the absence of neurological symptoms in some disorders as in some cases of viral encephalitis. They could also be part of the clinical picture in other cases such as psychosis or mood symptoms secondary to brucellosis or toxoplasmosis. Late-onset neuropsychiatric complications may also occur several years following the infection such as in the case of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis due to measles. Some Infectious diseases may have possible etiological role for major psychiatric disorders, based on yet unconfirmed reports for viral infectious diseases (e.g. Influenza virus and HSV-1) which are thought to have risk for developing schizophrenia and psychosis. Neuropsychiatric adverse effects can occur due to drugs (e.g. mefloquine, interferon-alpha) that are used for treatment of infectious diseases. Psychiatric symptoms can also be reactivated resulting from chronic, complicated and serious infections such as HIV that can lead to depression, anxiety or adjustment disorders, although CNS involvement can also be a possible etiological factor. Patients suffering from primary and severe psychiatric disorders are at increased risk of contracting infection; that is mainly related to high risk behaviors in patients with mania or schizophrenia. It is also important to consider that the co-occurrence of psychiatric symptoms and infection can be incidental (i.e. infectious diseases can occur in psychiatric patients regardless of the above mentioned factors). Early identification of the underlying etiology for organic/secondary psychiatric symptoms is essential for appropriate intervention and early treatment of the primary condition that could be the etiology of psychiatric symptoms so as to avoid unnecessary long-term psychiatric treatment and to avoid complications of possible misdiagnosis or delayed diagnosis of the primary condition.

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Neuropsychiatric Disease and <i>Toxoplasma gondii</i> Infection

Cited by 172 publications

References 225 publications

Seroprevalence of Toxoplasma gondii Infection in Patients with Alzheimer’s Disease

Seroprevalence of Toxoplasma gondii Infection in Patients with Alzheimer’s Disease

Toxoplasmosis and Public Health Genomics

Psychiatric Aspects of Infectious Diseases

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