Inflammatory cytokine network in schizophrenia

Objectives: The purpose of this review is to analyse, sum up and discuss the available literature on the role of inflammation and inflammatory cytokines in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia.

Methods: An electronic literature search of peer-reviewed English language articles using Pubmed was undertaken. These articles together with those published by us provided the background for the present review.

Results: An overview of the available literature on this issue clearly demonstrated the alterations in mRNA and protein expression levels of several proinflammatory and chemotactic cytokines in patients with schizophrenia. Importantly, some of these changes are genetically determined. It was noteworthy that, depending on the study population, some variations of the data obtained are detected.

Conclusions: Altered inflammatory cytokine production, both genetically and environmentally determined, is implicated in schizophrenia and contributes to disease-associated low-grade systemic inflammation. Proinflammatory and chemotactic cytokines and their receptors may represent additional therapeutic targets for treatment of schizophrenia.