A pilot study by Stanford Medicine found that a ketogenic diet improved metabolic and psychiatric conditions in patients with serious mental illnesses like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, who were on antipsychotic medications. The diet led to significant health improvements, suggesting dietary intervention as a potential treatment method.
“It’s very promising and very encouraging that you can take back control of your illness in some way, aside from the usual standard of care,” said Shebani Sethi, MD, associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and the first author of the new paper. A few years later, Sethi coined the term metabolic psychiatry, a new field that approaches mental health from an energy conversion perspective.In the four-month pilot trial, Sethi’s team followed 21 adult participants who were diagnosed with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, taking antipsychotic medications, and had a metabolic abnormality — such as weight gain, insulin resistance, hypertriglyceridemia, dyslipidemia or impaired glucose tolerance.
On average, the participants lost 10% of their body weight; reduced their waist circumference by 11% percent; and had lower blood pressure, body mass index, triglycerides, blood sugar levels and insulin resistance. The researchers were impressed that most of the participants stuck with the diet. “We saw more benefit with the adherent group compared with the semi-adherent group, indicating a potential dose-response relationship,” Sethi said.There is increasing evidence that psychiatric diseases such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder stem from metabolic deficits in the brain, which affect the excitability of neurons, Sethi said.
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