Scientists from the University of Edinburgh were part of a team that scrutinized data from more than 56,000 young people.
A new study suggests that frequently prescribed antibiotics may lower the risk of schizophrenia in young people. An international team of researchers, including researchers from the University of Edinburgh, made the discovery by analyzing data from extensive medical registers in Finland.
Scientists examined data from more than 56,000 adolescents who had been given antibiotics during a mental health visit. The results showed that patients treated with doxycycline had a 30 to 35 percent lower risk of developing schizophrenia compared to patients receiving other antibiotics.
The team suggested that doxycycline, a ‘broad-spectrum’ antibiotic commonly used for infections and acne, may have this effect because it affects inflammation and brain development.
Previous research has demonstrated that doxycycline can reduce inflammation in brain cells and affect synaptic pruning, a natural process by which the brain improves neural connections.
Too much pruning has been linked to the development of schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a serious mental disorder that usually appears in early adulthood and is often characterized by hallucinations and delusions.
The research team called the findings ‘exciting’, highlighting the potential for repurposing existing drugs that are widely used as preventative agents for serious mental illness.
Professor Ian Kelleher, lead researcher and Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the University of Edinburgh, said: “Around half of people with schizophrenia have previously received child and adolescent mental health services for other mental health problems.
“However, there are currently no interventions known to reduce the risk of developing schizophrenia in these young people, which makes these findings intriguing.
“Because this study is an observational study rather than a randomized controlled trial, we cannot make firm conclusions about causality, but this is an important signal to further investigate the protective effects of doxycycline and other anti-inflammatory treatments in adolescent psychiatric patients as a way to potentially reduce the risk of developing serious mental illness in adulthood.”
A team from the University of Edinburgh, University of Oulu, University College Dublin and St John of God Hospitaller Services Group conducted the study with funding from the Health Research Council.
The results of this study were published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.
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