Epps S Alisha
Department of Psychology, Whitworth University, Spokane, WA, United States.
Front Psychiatry. 2022 Oct 19;13:1041460. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.1041460. eCollection 2022.
A wealth of clinical and pre-clinical data supports a bidirectional comorbidity between depression and epilepsy. This suggests commonalities in underlying mechanisms that may serve as targets for more effective treatment strategies. Unfortunately, many patients with this comorbidity are highly refractory to current treatment strategies, while others experience a worsening of one arm of the comorbidity when treating the other arm. This highlights the need for novel pharmaceutical targets that may provide safe and effective relief for both depression and epilepsy symptoms. The endocannabinoid system (ECS) of the brain has become an area of intense interest for possible roles in depression and epilepsy. Several existing literature reviews have provided in-depth analysis of the involvement of various aspects of the ECS in depression or epilepsy separately, while others have addressed the effectiveness of different treatment strategies targeting the ECS in either condition individually. However, there is not currently a review that considers the ECS when both conditions are comorbid. This mini-review will address areas of common overlap between the ECS in depression and in epilepsy, such as commonalities in endocannabinoids themselves, their receptors, and degradative enzymes. These areas of overlap will be discussed alongside their implications for treatment of this challenging comorbidity.
大量临床和临床前数据支持抑郁症与癫痫之间的双向共病关系。这表明潜在机制存在共性，这些共性可能成为更有效治疗策略的靶点。不幸的是，许多患有这种共病的患者对当前治疗策略具有高度耐药性，而其他患者在治疗其中一种病症时，另一种病症会恶化。这凸显了对新型药物靶点的需求，这些靶点可能为抑郁症和癫痫症状提供安全有效的缓解。大脑的内源性大麻素系统（ECS）已成为抑郁症和癫痫潜在作用的一个备受关注的领域。现有的几篇文献综述分别对ECS各个方面在抑郁症或癫痫中的参与情况进行了深入分析，而其他综述则分别探讨了针对ECS的不同治疗策略在这两种病症中的有效性。然而，目前尚无一篇综述在两种病症共病时考虑ECS。本小型综述将探讨抑郁症和癫痫中ECS的共同重叠领域，例如内源性大麻素本身、其受体和降解酶的共性。这些重叠领域将与其对这种具有挑战性的共病治疗的影响一并讨论。
