The notion that what goes on in our heads can profoundly affect the typical functions of our bodies has gained traction over time, as decades of research shows how gut health can affect mood and even neurological disease.
A new study by an Australian research team now suggests that mental illness could manifest itself even more clearly in the body than in the brain. An analysis of more than 175,000 people suggests poor physical health scores may be a better predictor of mental illness than changes found on brain scans.
Lead author, psychiatrist and neuroscientist Ye Ella Tian, explained on Twitter that those diagnosed with mental illness showed subtle brain changes, as expected, but they also had “significantly poorer physical health in multiple body systems compared to their healthy peers.”
In some ways, that’s not so surprising. Research shows that mental illness is associated with poor physical health and chronic diseases such as obesity and obesity diabeteswhich may be related to the side effects of medication or inequalities in access to health care.
For example people with schizophrenia are near The risk of developing diabetes is three times higher than the general population; They also have a twofold increased risk of coronary artery disease. says Tien.
However, the impact of severe mental illness on other aspects of physical health, such as lung health, liver dysfunction and bone loss, is less well understood. To make matters worse, physical health in general has been “underappreciated, undertreated and often overlooked in psychiatry for decades,” according to Tian and colleagues at the University of Melbourne write.
compilation of a series of measurements MRI Using brain scans and health assessments from various study populations, the team produced results on brain health and the functioning of seven body systems, including the immune system, liver function (liver function), heart, lung and kidney health. This allowed them to compare the health scores of people diagnosed with mental illness to populations of people of the same age.
Differences in brain imaging results could allow accurate differentiation between the four mental illnesses studied: schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depressionand generalized anxiety disorder.
However, despite the neural basis of mental illness, the study found that individuals suffer from one or more of these disorders could be differentiated “with moderate accuracy” from age-matched healthy controls based on body health alone.
Body health scores for liver and kidney function, immune system and metabolism were consistently poor in all mental illnesses compared to healthy controls — and proved to be better predictors of a mental health diagnosis than brain imaging results.
That physical health measures outweighed differences in brain imaging results “was a rather surprising finding,” given how mental illness is ingrained in the dysfunctional brain, according to neuroscientist Andrew Zalesky of the University of Melbourne explained in a podcast.
Still, there are many possible reasons that explain why poor physical health is associated with severe mental illness: from the side effects of antipsychotics and mood-stabilizing drugs to the chronic stress, increased infections, and heightened immune responses experienced by people with mental illness. Research shows, for example, that people with schizophrenia have an increased risk of dying from it COVID-19 was almost three times as high than people without this disorder.
The researchers caution that their findings – which come largely from white British populations – are not intended as a diagnostic tool. “We should note here that these are people with a confirmed diagnosis,” says Zalesky added. “We don’t know whether this would remain the case before the disruption broke out.”
Instead, the findings aim to help psychiatrists understand how different aspects of physical health are affected by mental illness and encourage them to consider both the body and the mind when treating people with mental illness.
In this particular study, chronic physical health problems in people with mental illness often went undiagnosed, but the results “suggest that poor body health and functioning may be important manifestations that require ongoing treatment in patients,” the researchers said conclude.
The study was published in JAMA Psychiatry.
