Schizophrenia was approached throughout the world in 2008, in the desire to find new ways of treatment, and among them scientists studied the efficiency of neurofeedback techniques and tried to refine them in order to obtain better results. A big research nucleus appeared in Australia, Holland, Turkey and USA.

          Schizophrenia is classically approached through medication treatment and neurofeedback is less used. Othmer considered Schizophrenia as a disorder characterized by mental state discontinuities in time, and this training stabilize the nervous system in a very helpful way.

          Other ways of approaching Schizophrenia involve reducing amplitudes and coherence in beta high band, according to data offered by QEEG previously evaluation.

          Studies throughout the years (1950) on neurotransmitters have initially stated the involvement of dopamine, which triggered Schizophrenia if dysfunctional, and this proved the efficiency of chlorpromazine treatment. 50 years later, researchers focused their effort on the path of an involved neurotransmitter, glutamate. In 2007, Eli Lilly published a study on glutamate inhibitory substances that reduce psychosis.

          In September 2007, researchers from the University of California, San Diego, showed that along with glutamate, there is another neurotransmitter, which interferes with the signals produced by glutamate, and thus alter the cerebral cells, called GABA. The damage on GABA cells mimics the symptoms noted in Schizophrenia, and this lead to the uses of both theories.

          Modern Schizophrenia diagnosis requires the persistence of positive psychotic symptoms for at least 6 months. However, psychosis is not the only symptom. Most cases also develop a weak work memory and the patients are incapable of recognizing rapidly new situations and rules, a “flexible” cognitive ability. These cognitive characteristics contribute to the chronic disability of most patients, considered as a third dominium, the dominium of negative symptoms regarding motivation, emotions, and the desire to interact with others. But the most severely damaged ability is the capacity to interact with others and the constant state of confusion, as they do not understand what is happening around them.

          Another study published in 2007, in Science, by the University of California, San Diego, showed that the interference of glutamate with NMDA signals in mice, can reproduce one of the most argued discoveries regarding Schizophrenia: the rupture of interneurons that use GABA signal. As a metaphor: “GABA is yin if glutamate is yang”. While glutamate is the election neurotransmitter for pyramidal cells, with excitatory role, GABA is the neurotransmitter for interneurons, with inhibitory effect on the pyramidal cells. Lewis and coworkers are now testing substances that should normalize GABA function of cerebral interneurons on persons with Schizophrenia, maybe with benefic effects regarding the symptoms. In 2008, Behrens worked with Lisman from the University of Brandeis, and they found concrete evidence concerning the relation between glutamate and GABA, by directly recording the altered electrical activity of destroyed GABA interneurons, with the blockage of NMDA receptors.

          After these new discoveries, researchers will focus upon neuronal circuits, as well as on glutamate-metabotropic receptors, glutamate receptors, molecules that help control the free glutamate from the synaptic space, on GABA interneurons and their feedback linkage with the pyramidal cells that release glutamate. Other approaches will be focused on the remaining neurotransmitters such as serotonin, acetylcholine and dopamine, on the latter because of its subtle altering effect regarding the communication between glutamate and GABBA cells.

          It is yet to be determined if the modern Schizophrenia treatment will be based on medication or on sophisticated techniques such as neurofeedback. Neurofeedback is known to help in adjusting neurotransmitters as well as adjacent neuronal circuits. (Material adjusted after The Dana Alliance’s 2009 Progress Report on Brain Research NY- Hakon Heimer).

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