Author: Sofia Ruiz-Sierra
Editors: Chloe Rybicki-Kler, Emily Eberhardt, & Madeline Barron
Illustrator: Jacquelyn Roberts
Imagine a world where doctors had no way of measuring blood pressure. They would have a hard time determining how hard your heart is working or whether you were at risk for serious conditions, like heart disease or stroke. Blood pressure is an example of a biological marker, or biomarker. Simply put, biomarkers provide insights into your health status.
Similarly to how blood pressure serves as a biomarker for heart health, biomarkers may also be critical in understanding psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia. These biomarkers would allow researchers to obtain objective and reproducible measures to prevent, diagnose, and treat psychotic disorders. Providing an accurate diagnosis to patients increases their opportunities for early treatment and improved prognosis. However, identifying reliable biomarkers that allow scientists to understand and quantify complex cognitive disorders is complicated, as results are often inconclusive. Nevertheless, over the past decade, a brain protein called the Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) has emerged as a potential biomarker for cognitive deficits in psychotic disorders.
Continue reading “Can protein levels in the brain predict early stages of psychosis?”
misciwriters.com 