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UCLA STUDY PINPOINTS TWO GENES THAT INCREASE RISK FOR POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER
Health Canal
Jan 15 2015
Heredity may influence people's predisposition for PTSD
UCLA Dr. Armen Goenjian
Why do some people develop post-traumatic stress disorder while others
who suffered the same ordeal do not? A new UCLA discovery may shed
light on the answer.
UCLA scientists have linked two genes to the debilitating mental
disorder, suggesting that heredity influences a person's risk of
developing PTSD. Published in the February 2015 edition of the Journal
of Affective Disorders, the findings could provide a biological basis
for diagnosing and treating PTSD more effectively in the future.
"Many people suffer with post-traumatic stress disorder after surviving
a life-threatening ordeal like war, rape or a natural disaster,"
explained lead author Dr. Armen Goenjian, a researcher at the Semel
Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. "But not
everyone who experiences trauma suffers from PTSD. We investigated
whether PTSD has genetic underpinnings that make some people more
vulnerable to the syndrome than others."
In 1988, Goenjian, an Armenian American, rushed to Spitak, Armenia,
after a 6.8 magnitude earthquake devastated the country. The temblor
leveled entire towns and cities, killing more than 25,000 people,
two-thirds of them children.
With support from the Armenian Relief Society, Goenjian and his
colleagues helped establish a pair of psychiatric clinics that treated
earthquake survivors for 21 years. A dozen multigenerational families
in northern Armenia agreed to allow their blood samples to be sent
to UCLA, where Goenjian and his colleagues combed the DNA of 200
individuals for genetic clues to psychiatric vulnerability.
In 2012, his team discovered that PTSD was more common in survivors who
carried two gene variants associated with depression. In the current
study, Goenjian and first author Julia Bailey, an adjunct assistant
professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health,
focused on two genes, COMT and TPH-2, which play important roles in
brain function.
COMT is an enzyme that degrades dopamine, a neurotransmitter that
controls the brain's reward and pleasure centers and helps regulate
mood, thinking, attention and behavior. Too much or too little dopamine
can influence various neurological and psychological disorders.
TPH-2 controls the production of serotonin, a neurotransmitter that
regulates mood, sleep and alertness -- all of which are disrupted in
PTSD. Serotonin is the target of a group of drugs called selective
serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, which were designed to
treat depression. Now, more physicians are prescribing SSRIs to treat
disorders beyond depression, including PTSD.
"We found a significant association between variants of COMT and
TPH-2 with PTSD symptoms, suggesting that these genes contribute
to the onset and persistence of the disorder," Goenjian said. "Our
results indicate that people who carry these genetic variants may be
at higher risk of developing PTSD."
The team used the most recent PTSD criteria from the American
Psychiatric Association's diagnostic manual to measure genes' role
in predisposing someone to the disorder. The new criteria increased
estimates of the degree to which PTSD is genetic to 60 percent;
estimates based on older criteria reached only 41 percent.
"Assessments of patients based upon the latest diagnostic criteria may
boost the field's chances of finding new genetic markers for PTSD,"
Goenjian said. "We hope our findings will lead to molecular methods
for screening people at risk for this disorder and identify new drug
therapies for prevention and treatment."
Goenjian cautioned that PTSD is likely caused by multiple genes,
and that more research must be done to find more of the genes involved.
PTSD affects about 7 percent of Americans. It has been a pressing
health issue for many veterans returning from tours in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
The study's co-authors were Ernest Noble and Sugandha Dandekar, both
of UCLA; Alan Steinberg of the UCLA-Duke National Childhood Center
for Traumatic Stress; David Walling of the Collaborative Neuroscience
Network; and Sofia Stepanian of UC Riverside.
Media Contact
Elaine Schmidt 310-794-2272
http://www.healthcanal.com/mental-health-behavior/59152-ucla-study-pinpoints-two-genes-that-increase-risk-for-post-traumatic-stress-disorder.html
Health Canal
Jan 15 2015
Heredity may influence people's predisposition for PTSD
UCLA Dr. Armen Goenjian
Why do some people develop post-traumatic stress disorder while others
who suffered the same ordeal do not? A new UCLA discovery may shed
light on the answer.
UCLA scientists have linked two genes to the debilitating mental
disorder, suggesting that heredity influences a person's risk of
developing PTSD. Published in the February 2015 edition of the Journal
of Affective Disorders, the findings could provide a biological basis
for diagnosing and treating PTSD more effectively in the future.
"Many people suffer with post-traumatic stress disorder after surviving
a life-threatening ordeal like war, rape or a natural disaster,"
explained lead author Dr. Armen Goenjian, a researcher at the Semel
Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. "But not
everyone who experiences trauma suffers from PTSD. We investigated
whether PTSD has genetic underpinnings that make some people more
vulnerable to the syndrome than others."
In 1988, Goenjian, an Armenian American, rushed to Spitak, Armenia,
after a 6.8 magnitude earthquake devastated the country. The temblor
leveled entire towns and cities, killing more than 25,000 people,
two-thirds of them children.
With support from the Armenian Relief Society, Goenjian and his
colleagues helped establish a pair of psychiatric clinics that treated
earthquake survivors for 21 years. A dozen multigenerational families
in northern Armenia agreed to allow their blood samples to be sent
to UCLA, where Goenjian and his colleagues combed the DNA of 200
individuals for genetic clues to psychiatric vulnerability.
In 2012, his team discovered that PTSD was more common in survivors who
carried two gene variants associated with depression. In the current
study, Goenjian and first author Julia Bailey, an adjunct assistant
professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health,
focused on two genes, COMT and TPH-2, which play important roles in
brain function.
COMT is an enzyme that degrades dopamine, a neurotransmitter that
controls the brain's reward and pleasure centers and helps regulate
mood, thinking, attention and behavior. Too much or too little dopamine
can influence various neurological and psychological disorders.
TPH-2 controls the production of serotonin, a neurotransmitter that
regulates mood, sleep and alertness -- all of which are disrupted in
PTSD. Serotonin is the target of a group of drugs called selective
serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, which were designed to
treat depression. Now, more physicians are prescribing SSRIs to treat
disorders beyond depression, including PTSD.
"We found a significant association between variants of COMT and
TPH-2 with PTSD symptoms, suggesting that these genes contribute
to the onset and persistence of the disorder," Goenjian said. "Our
results indicate that people who carry these genetic variants may be
at higher risk of developing PTSD."
The team used the most recent PTSD criteria from the American
Psychiatric Association's diagnostic manual to measure genes' role
in predisposing someone to the disorder. The new criteria increased
estimates of the degree to which PTSD is genetic to 60 percent;
estimates based on older criteria reached only 41 percent.
"Assessments of patients based upon the latest diagnostic criteria may
boost the field's chances of finding new genetic markers for PTSD,"
Goenjian said. "We hope our findings will lead to molecular methods
for screening people at risk for this disorder and identify new drug
therapies for prevention and treatment."
Goenjian cautioned that PTSD is likely caused by multiple genes,
and that more research must be done to find more of the genes involved.
PTSD affects about 7 percent of Americans. It has been a pressing
health issue for many veterans returning from tours in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
The study's co-authors were Ernest Noble and Sugandha Dandekar, both
of UCLA; Alan Steinberg of the UCLA-Duke National Childhood Center
for Traumatic Stress; David Walling of the Collaborative Neuroscience
Network; and Sofia Stepanian of UC Riverside.
Media Contact
Elaine Schmidt 310-794-2272
http://www.healthcanal.com/mental-health-behavior/59152-ucla-study-pinpoints-two-genes-that-increase-risk-for-post-traumatic-stress-disorder.html