Mental disorder from meat and sausage products

 

Mental disorder from meat and sausage products

Some meat and sausage products can apparently exacerbate mental disorders, such as mania. Less sausage could therefore help to experience less or shorter manic episodes.

informationntechnology

Possible cause of mental disorders: nitrates in some meat products

In a study published in Molecular Psychiatry , researchers  discovered that people who presented to the clinic for a manic episode were 3.5 times more likely to have eaten nitrate-treated meats than was the case in people without serious mental disorders. No such connection could be observed with any other food.

Previously, experiments with rats had shown that the animals developed mania-like symptoms if nitrates were added to their food for a few weeks. The proportion of nitrate was the same as that contained in a single dried meat snack or hot dog.

gethealthandbeauty

Diet type is a major risk factor for mental illness

Although we know some risk factors including hereditary factors, separation, loss for the development of manic phases which can also occur in bipolar disorder, for example, a specific cause has not yet been identified. Therefore researchers are increasingly looking for the causes in the area of ​​nutrition, which could play a decisive role here.

Study, Professor of Neurovirology at Baltimore, believes that the available study results indicate that certain diets and the composition of the intestinal flora can contribute to the development of mania and other mental disorders.

Change diet and reduce risk of manic episodes

"Future educations in this area could lead to the fact that we can reduce the risk of manic episodes in susceptible people with a targeted change in diet ," says Yolken, an expert on infectious diseases who, among other things, the connection between viruses which are transmitted with food and mental disorders.

However, since study did not take into account the amount of appropriately preserved meat products consumed, it is not possible to state how much dried or smoked meat products can increase the risk of mania.

technologybeam

Nitrates in sausages and sausages

Nitrates have long been used as preservatives for dried and smoked meat products, but also for sausages and sausages, and are considered a risk factor for some forms of cancer and neurodegenerative diseases. Therefore, Yolken suspects that it could be this substance that has such a negative effect on the psyche.

The suspicion was confirmed by another rat experiment. Some of the animals received smoked meat with nitrate, another part received nitrate-free smoked meat and a third part served as a control group. It was found that the nitrate group suffered from sleep disorders and hyperactivity, while the nitrate-free group behaved just as inconspicuously as the control group.

Intestinal flora changes with a diet containing nitrates and now has a negative effect on the psyche

If the intestinal flora of the rats was examined, clear differences were found when the animals had been given nitrate-containing food. Some mechanisms in the brain also differ from those of the nitrate-free group. The brain changes were reminiscent of changes that can also be observed in bipolar disorder.

Probiotics reduce the number of manic episodes

In a study with people who suffered from bipolar disorder, Yolken gave probiotics to some of the test subjects after a manic episode in order to positively influence their intestinal flora. The result was that the probiotic group had fewer re-episodes of manic episode over the next six months than the participants who had not received probiotics.

Mania and Bipolar Disorder: Nitrate-Free Diets and Probiotics

In a mania or manic episode, those affected experience an excessive feeling of elation. You feel a strong arousal and are extremely energetic. In the course of such a phase, things are often done contracts concluded, purchases made, promises made, etc. that are then regretted and have to be laboriously reversed.

The manic episode can last for weeks or months. If it occurs in the context of bipolar disorder, it is repeatedly replaced by equally long periods of depression. But manic episodes can also be observed in other mental disorders. Bipolar disorder alone affects 1 to 3 percent of the US population.

As the studies described above show, it is advisable to avoid nitrate-containing meat and sausage products in the case of mania or bipolar disorder or other mental disorders and to build up the intestinal flora with the help of high-quality probiotics.