It was a fortuitous discovery that put Dr. Patrick Lemoîne, psychiatrist in Lyon and doctor of neurosciences, on the track of “dopamino-dependent depression”. One of his patients who did not respond to various antidepressant treatmentsotherwise seemed to have all the certain symptoms of the Parkinson disease. But the analyzes showed no clinical signs of this disease.
Act on dopamine receptors
At first, the doctor tries to treat this patient’s depression with an anti-parkinsonian treatment that acts on dopamine receptors (a neurotransmitter that allows brain cells to communicate with each other). But after a few weeks, the treatment no longer works, as if its effects were wearing off.
“The reason is simple, when you give a drug that permanently “hits” on certain receptors (in this case the dopamine receptors) there is always the risk that the body puts these receptors on hold” explains the psychiatrist.
To increase the level of dopamine and treat his patient’s dopamine-dependent depression, Dr. Lemoîne and his colleague Jacques Mouret therefore had the idea of providing the “precursor” allowing the body to produce dopamine: L- tyrosine, an amino acid. “I prescribed relatively large doses of L-tyrosine and I was able to obtain the cure for this patient. Then the cure for many others, since I now have more than twenty years of hindsight on this form of depression” explains the doctor.
Signs of dopamine-dependent depression
These two decades of hindsight on the disease have also enabled the doctor to observe that patients who suffer from dopamine-dependent depression share certain symptoms:
• They alternate “on/off” periods of the mood.
• They have often gone through a period of prolonged stress such as a burnout or overwork.
• They are very restless in their sleep.
• They eat a diet that contains little red meat.
As a treatment for this form of mild to moderate depression, the doctor prescribes relatively large doses of L-tyrosine away from meals. “The average dose is 1600 mg in the morning, 1600 mg at midday and 800 mg at 4 p.m., preferably taken between meals”. Only contraindication: taking vitamin B6 which promotes the destruction of L-tyrosine. “It’s the only vitamin that destroys tyrosine. And every time a patient with DDD has relapsed, it’s because they’ve taken vitamin B6, either as a multivitamin supplement or as part of a yeast”.
“After developing the treatment for these DDDs, we were able to attempt to prescribe L-tyrosine in other cases where a dopamine abnormality could be suspected” adds the doctor. L-tyrosine has thus been successfully prescribed in patients suffering from Parkinson’s disease, in other who suffer from impatience as well as in some cases narcolepsy.
Learn more : Heal his head without medication or almost, Dr. Patrick Lemoine, ed. Robert Laffont
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Depression: it’s not just drugs that can cure it
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