what do you know about dopamine and schizophrenia?

I learned tonight that too much dopamine production or reception causes psychosis. Too little causes Parkinson's Disease and depression.

I've been diagnosed with a form of schizophrenia for 20+ years, and have been on the maximum amount of Abilify (30mg) for a long time now. I am depressed, my cognitive functions are bad, and I am not hallucinating or having paranoid thoughts anymore. But the depression is almost killing me. Meds like Abilify decrease dopamine production and reception as to control psychosis. I think though, that my psychosis is dormant and I'm being treated with too much Abilify now. I bet if I increased my dopamine by exercising more and eating more dopamine rich foods, like bananas, I would feel better. I'm going to try it.

Google "dopamine" sometime and learn more about the relationship between psychosis and dopamine, and between depression and dopamine. There's a lot of new studies out there.

Hi, hartbroken. How about asking your doctor to lower your Abilify to see if that helps?

Interesting info about dopamine and schizophrenia!

I was actually prescribed wellbutrin until last week, which raises dopamine and has been making me psychotic, which is why I was taken off of it.

What you say is true and you could benefit from a reduction in the Abilify, though it's important to remember that there are a lot more neurotransmitters than just the dopamine system affected by atypical anti-psychotics like Abilify, so you may not get the relief you want. The effects on certain 5-HT receptors give Abilify many of its anti-depressant and anxiolytic qualities, and it even has an effect on serotonin, so you could end up more depressed when you lower your dose. The only way to find out is to experiment with lowering the dose.

There are also a lot of anti-depressants available which don't interfere with anti-psychotics, and adding one of these would be an option for your depression if you find improving your lifestyle isn't enough.

Good luck!

I must be an anomaly then, I've been extremely depressed and psychotic at the same time. I always thought depression was linked to serotonin levels though, atleast for me it might be because Prozac works pretty well for me.

Depression can involve a lot of different neurotransmitters. I get psychotic features with my depressive episodes too, so obviously it's not lack of dopamine making me depressed either, especially since my depression is mostly cured by dopamine inhibiting drugs.

Really, I'm not sure even the experts understand half of what goes on in mental illness. There's a frightening amount of guess-work involved.