Help transform young lives through schizophrenia research

“The day Connor died I thought, ‘Is this the best we can do?’ The years after a young person leaves school are so important, they’re finding their way in life and in their relationships and careers. But all that slipped through Connor's fingers because he was just trying to get through the day, struggling with his illness.” — Carolyn, Connor’s Mum

Schizophrenia is one of the top 15 leading causes of disability worldwide.

Not enough is known about mental illnesses like schizophrenia, and we are still unable to treat everyone successfully. As a result, people living with this disease can feel not in control of their own mind and behaviour, find it hard to socialize with family and friends and can be left feeling helpless, isolated and alone.

Too many people living with mental illness are unable to access the support they need because the current medications help only some people and can leave people feeling blunted and overweight. With your help, our dedicated scientists can continue to carry out vital research into disorders of the brain and mind to develop better treatments and, hopefully one day, prevent them altogether.

Your gift today will help NeuRA's scientists transform the options that psychiatrists have in treating schizophrenia – and eventually help to save lives through schizophrenia research. As an example, it was not so long ago that someone with breast cancer had a poor prognosis. However, through research better biomarkers and new treatments aimed at particular changes were developed and this changed the outlook for people with breast cancer. We can and must do this for schizophrenia.

A new direction in schizophrenia research here at NeuRA

“Everyone thinks that you’ve got to directly change what’s happening in the brain to see results in the treatment of psychiatric illnesses. But in our study, we saw benefit from a drug that’s working on the immune cells that then can go an impact the brain.” — Senior Professor Cyndi Shannon Weickert

At the moment, all patients with schizophrenia are treated with the same antipsychotic drugs, but they do not work well for about 1/3 of the people in terms of significantly reducing hallucinations and delusions and disorganization, and most of these drugs show limited improvement in a person’s cognitive and negative symptoms.

But recent research conducted here at NeuRA has taken a new direction, with a clinical trial of an anti-inflammatory drug that only recruited chronically ill schizophrenia patients with elevated measures of peripheral inflammation.

Led by Senior Professor Cyndi Shannon Weickert, this is the first study to find that an injection of an anti-inflammatory biological known as Canakinumab in people with neuroinflammatory schizophrenia can lower inflammation in the body and that his can provide some symptomatic relief.

These findings have enhanced our existing biological understandings of schizophrenia and takes the field a step closer to personalised and more effective treatments.

Right now, schizophrenia has limited treatments and no cure. Being able to tailor medication to individual patients, similar to what is done for breast cancer, would have huge implications for people living with schizophrenia and their families and friends.

Please make a generous gift today to support vital schizophrenia research that could lead to more personalised, effective treatments for disorders of the brain and mind, and stop families and friends losing loved ones too soon.