They're investigating the use of a drug that they don't understand to treat a condition that they don't understand, through the lens of one model that variously competes with or incompletely conforms to a myriad of other models of the condition.
In order to what? Nebulously "manage" a complex neurological difference that will always defy reversion to anything else?
It sounds like they want something that they can prescribe, period. And it sounds like it has the potential to further complicate already difficult lives.
Type 1 Autism may serve a general human gene pool function in terms of edge-dripping a specific intelligence trait into it (low probability of reproduction, protecting general social skill in the pool, but adding a divergent pattern solving skill at the edges).
While autism is difficult, I'm not sure that solving for it in the context of industrial medicine is wise. We don't want to solve for Nicola Tesla, for example.
Type 2 and 3 Autism could be genetically unsuccessful attempts at Type 1 autism development, to spitball. Assuming they are actually related, in most cases. Such management theoretically could be helpful here, but I think that these people deserve a lot better than injected parasite medicine with a lot of side effects. Besides, try getting an autistic child used to regular injections.
Though a low-side effect oral or transdermal medication that would, say, specifically enhance energy support to the Autistic PFC with few side effects could be game changing. Likely for many more conditions than autism.
Inventing such a medication that doesn't lead to a worse baseline would be critical and perhaps unlikely.
Then again its possible that the unique pattern solving ability of the Autistic mind is related to the relative lack of energy supply to an increased volume of PFC neurons; and the subsequent failure of inhibition. Possibly accounting for increased environmental information perception, at least in-part. Which may in turn be mirrored in expanded cognition involved in pattern identification.
The ideal, which again I think is unlikely, would be a PRN medication that could "quiet" the autistic mind via providing more energy to the PFC; while having no withdrawal semi-permanent side effects.
They're investigating the use of a drug that they don't understand to treat a condition that they don't understand...
You'd probably be shocked to figure out how often this happens - and it used to happen a lot more in no small part because we didn't have the tools we have today: MRIs and better microscopes and other tech has really helped our understanding of the body. We are still figuring out how exactly the body works, after all, to the point that we occasionally discover a new body part. Of course we are going to do things we don't understand. Yet.
This isn't limited to medicine, either.
Maybe they want something to prescribe. For a lot of diseases, that's better than nothing. For example, I have MS. They know more than they used to about MS, but most of my life they've not known enough. I have medicine that isn't a cure, but I'll take it. Modern medicines mean that modern folks with MS have a much better quality of life than folks that didn't have medications. I'm more likely to have mobility and things like that. I'll take it.
My ex was schizophrenic. Medicine gave them a life. They still couldn't work, but they weren't suffering as much either. Again, not a cure, but help.
Imperfect cures or medicines that treat the symptoms are so much better than no help at all. This is where a lot of medicine starts - treating a symptom, and by doing so learning a bit more about the disease or affliction.
My ex was schizoaffective. They thought BP1 for a while, but then she started hallucinating while baseline. Anyway, I've seen her take all the meds. Some work sometimes. Then they don't. Most of the time we'd be dealing with symptoms of the meds, which are not easy. When she was completely manic even the highest dose of some meds would not work for her. Actually a side effect of one of the meds had the same symptoms as schizophrenia, so in that case what was even the point?
Neuroleptic-induced deficit syndrome (NIDS) is a psychopathological syndrome that develops in some patients who take high doses of an antipsychotic for an extended time... characterized by the same symptoms that constitute the negative symptoms of schizophrenia
You're right, a lot of times it seems like they just wanted to give her a pill and strap her down to a bed. Good sleep was far more important to regulating her wellbeing, but that was very difficult with the side effect of akathisia, which is common of antipsychotics. So it became a matter of upping the dose until it would make her pass out after hours of writhing pain. A daily occurrence.
So I could see why taking the meds were difficult.
If you told me I could take a pill to cure my autism but it would have the same symptoms as an antipsychotic, no thank you I wouldn't do it.
I don't have a lot of experience with using research papers, but I feel like people writing these articles don't either.
> In 2017, Naviaux and his team completed early clinical testing for suramin, the only drug approved in humans that can target ATP signaling and which is normally used to treat African sleeping sickness.
What's even the point of writing this? I found two papers, and the effects were so weak that it's hard to tell whether it even makes sense to pursue this further. Most results were not statistically significant, and the one that was did not come from a higher dosage.
But it's this sort of reporting that makes desperate parents give their children bleach enemas and horse dewormer.
They're investigating the use of a drug that they don't understand to treat a condition that they don't understand, through the lens of one model that variously competes with or incompletely conforms to a myriad of other models of the condition.
In order to what? Nebulously "manage" a complex neurological difference that will always defy reversion to anything else?
It sounds like they want something that they can prescribe, period. And it sounds like it has the potential to further complicate already difficult lives.
Type 1 Autism may serve a general human gene pool function in terms of edge-dripping a specific intelligence trait into it (low probability of reproduction, protecting general social skill in the pool, but adding a divergent pattern solving skill at the edges).
While autism is difficult, I'm not sure that solving for it in the context of industrial medicine is wise. We don't want to solve for Nicola Tesla, for example.
Type 2 and 3 Autism could be genetically unsuccessful attempts at Type 1 autism development, to spitball. Assuming they are actually related, in most cases. Such management theoretically could be helpful here, but I think that these people deserve a lot better than injected parasite medicine with a lot of side effects. Besides, try getting an autistic child used to regular injections.
Though a low-side effect oral or transdermal medication that would, say, specifically enhance energy support to the Autistic PFC with few side effects could be game changing. Likely for many more conditions than autism.
Inventing such a medication that doesn't lead to a worse baseline would be critical and perhaps unlikely.
Then again its possible that the unique pattern solving ability of the Autistic mind is related to the relative lack of energy supply to an increased volume of PFC neurons; and the subsequent failure of inhibition. Possibly accounting for increased environmental information perception, at least in-part. Which may in turn be mirrored in expanded cognition involved in pattern identification.
The ideal, which again I think is unlikely, would be a PRN medication that could "quiet" the autistic mind via providing more energy to the PFC; while having no withdrawal semi-permanent side effects.