A new innovation could revolutionize medicine: there would be a blood test that would make it possible to diagnose bipolarity. Progress never stops. On social networks, the discovery is attributed to Professor Raoul Belzeaux, currently a psychiatrist at the Montpellier University Hospital.
For many Internet users, this is impossible. And to tell the truth, it’s a bit what we say to ourselves when we hear the news. “Detecting a mental disorder by blood? Truly ? asks one of them. “It’s just bullshit. “Some even dare to make a comparison: “Obviously all the Raoul teachers are also crossed out. “A reference to our dear Didier Raoult who wanted to cure Covid-19 with hydroxychloroquine. 20 minutes discusses this discovery.
FAKE OFF
According to the High Authority for Health, it takes ten long years on average between the appearance of the first symptoms and the medical diagnosis of bipolar disorder. So inevitably, a blood test would be much simpler and faster. A boon for people who suffer from this pathology ranked among the 10 most disabling diseases by the World Health Organization. Well, it will soon be the case, because this test is very real.
Dr. Raoul Belzeaux, previously a psychiatrist at the University Hospitals of Marseille, as well as other researchers and doctors from the FondaMental Foundation, are behind the discovery. “Bipolarity is a constraining disease, affecting daily life. It can concern different areas such as cognitive faculties – by disturbing memory, attention or the executive functions of patients -, sleep, or even manifest itself through excessive fatigue “. explains the foundation.
This delay in diagnosis penalizes patients who cannot benefit from the right treatment or the right follow-up. “This discrepancy is explained by the lack of knowledge of the disease on the part of doctors, who often associate the symptoms of bipolarity with those of depression”, advances the foundation. So that currently, 40% of depressives could actually suffer from bipolarity without being diagnosed, according to estimates. However, “taking antidepressants can even aggravate the disorders in a bipolar patient” say the researchers.
Clinical trials have yet to validate the test
Through a study published in 2021, experts have found that bipolarity leaves traces in the blood. They identified blood biomarkers to refine the diagnosis of bipolar disorder. More precisely, the detection and measurement of cytokines in the blood, an inflammatory biomarker, make it possible to differentiate patients suffering from bipolar disorders from those suffering from a depressive disorder. The test is therefore only applicable after a diagnosis of depression made by a doctor: it then only allows “to discriminate depression from bipolar disorder”.
For this discovery, Professor Raoul Belzeaux received the 2022 Marcel Dassault Prize for Innovation. psychiatry at the service of patients. “This prize will facilitate the financing of the clinical trial necessary to validate the rapid screening test and develop its industrial exploitation”, announced the CHU of Montpellier. on his site.
The effectiveness of this test has yet to be confirmed by a clinical trial. It is intended to be included on the list of products authorized and reimbursed by Health Insurance, for the benefit of the patient and our health system.
Another similar test is in the spotlight: that of the start-up Aleciag, a biopharmaceutical company based in Hérault. “When the brain malfunctions, it sends signals through the body, like a diseased kidney or liver would,” explains Dinah Weissmann, co-founder of the company, in West-France. The test called Edit-B was developed after ten years of work, and will be marketed in early 2023 in Italy and Switzerland. This will then be the case in France, at an undisclosed rate. Discussions with the health authorities with a view to its possible reimbursement by Social Security are underway.