Abstract
Schizophrenia (SZ) is a debilitating and heterogeneous disease. We hypothesized that the oxytocin (OXT) system, inflammation and one-carbon metabolism would have a link with SZ. In this study, serum OXT, OXT receptor (OXTR), interleukin-6 (IL-6), high sensitivity CRP (hsCRP) and homocysteine (Hcy) levels were measured in 52 first-episode schizophrenia (FES) patients and 41 healthy controls (HC) from the Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University. Meanwhile, the mRNA expressions of OXT and OXTR genes were determined by real-time quantitative PCR. Serum OXT and OXTR levels were significantly lower in FES patients (518.96 ± 22.22 and 174.60 ± 17.11 pg/ml) than the HC group (711.58 ± 40.57 and 252.15 ± 20.62 pg/ml). Serum IL-6 and hsCRP levels showed no difference between the two groups (1.82 ± 0.30 vs. 1.69 ± 0.36 pg/ml, 0.66 (0.22, 1.07) vs. 0.31 (0.13, 0.91) mg/L), but serum Hcy levels were significantly higher in FES patients (20.18 ± 1.83 vs. 15.24 ± 0.82 μmol/ml). The FES patients (0.27 ± 0.02 and 0.20 ± 0.02) have relatively higher mRNA expressions of OXT and OXTR genes than the HC group (0.16 ± 0.01 and 0.14 ± 0.01). In summary, our results suggested the possible function of the OXT system and Hcy in the pathogenesis of SZ.
Highlights
Schizophrenia (SZ) is a debilitating and heterogeneous disease with unknown mechanism
Serum OXT and OXT receptor (OXTR) levels were significantly lower in first-episode schizophrenia (FES) patients (518.96 ± 22.22 and 174.60 ± 17.11 pg/ml) than the healthy controls (HC) group (711.58 ± 40.57 and 252.15 ± 20.62 pg/ml)
We found that serum OXT and OXTR levels were significantly lower in FES patients than in the HC group
Summary
Schizophrenia (SZ) is a debilitating and heterogeneous disease with unknown mechanism. Increasing evidence has shown that OXT might be the potential therapeutic target for SZ patients in animal and clinical case-control research [1, 2]. Several randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have investigated the efficacy of OXT on improving positive symptoms, negative symptoms and cognitive deficits in SZ patients [3,4,5,6]. Alterations of OXT levels are reported in several studies; the endogenous OXT levels were still conflicting in SZ patients with higher [7] and lower [8] amounts in plasma and tantamount levels in CSF [9] when compared with healthy controls (HC). The peripheral and central OXTR levels have only been scarcely reported
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