THE ESSENTIAL
- Post-traumatic stress treatment today includes psychotherapy and sometimes the use of antidepressants.
- This disorder affects between 5 and 12% of the population.
- In 20% of cases, post-traumatic stress becomes chronic.
A drug can have many uses, and some are discovered years later. This is the case with clonidine, a treatment drughigh blood pressure and attention deficit disorder for over 50 years. According to research published in Molecular psychiatryIt may also be effective in the treatment post-traumatic stress.
What is the high blood pressure drug clonidine?
Clonidine acts on adrenergic receptors in the brain. However, they are involved in the post-traumatic stress. According to the authors of the study, they could strengthen traumatic memory. The team of Georgia Medical College from the University of Augusta (USA) was therefore interested in the effects of clonidine on post-traumatic stress and that of guanfacine, another drug capable of acting on these specific receptors. Two types of tests were carried out: tests on genetically modified mice and others on neurones from human stem cells.
Post-traumatic stress: 2 antihypertensives checked
In the study, mice were given a mild shock and then treated with clonidine immediately after returning to the site. Chocolat. “Clonidine-treated mice showed a significantly reduced response, (…) compared to untreated mice when brought back to the scene of the crime, Analyze the authors. In fact, their response sounded more like mice that had never been shocked..”
Guanfacine had no effect on this behavior. Researchers say they can’t know for sure how much Mouse remember what happened. However, they state that “clear that those treated with clonidine did not show the same apparent response as untreated mice or those given guanfacine..
The drug appears to have reduced his shock memory, which is the goal of post-traumatic stress treatments. “The goal is not to erase memories like those of war, but to reduce their disruptive impact on a soldier’s life.observes Qin Wang, lead author of the study.
Clonidine is said to “reduce the strength of bad memory”
When a person returns to the scene of a shock, as in an accident, the synapses of the neurons that carry the memory of what happened become unstable, and then the memory stabilizes again. “This natural dynamic offers the possibility of intervening in reconsolidation and thus of reducing less the force of a bad memory.Estimations de Qin Wang.
It is precisely for this specific purpose that the scientific team wishes to use clonidine. In addition, adrenergic drugs such as clonidine bind to receptors of central nervous system to lower blood levels of stress hormones that increase blood pressure and heart rate. For the authors, clonidine could become an effective treatment for people suffering from a post-traumatic stress related to the pandemic or to older causes such as wars.