Schizophrenia Daily News Blog

Gene Versions linked with Childhood Schizophrenia

Japanese Researchers announced this week that they've identified a link between the "Tryptophan hydroxylase" gene and childhood-onset schizophrenia

��� "We explored the relationship between the tryptophan hydroxylase gene
polymorphism and susceptibility to childhood-onset schizophrenia in a Japanese sample.

Subjects were 51 Japanese patients who met DSM-IV criteria for schizophrenia before age 16 and 148 Japanese healthy controls," scientists in Japan report.

There was a nearly doubling of the risk for childhood-onset schizophrenia associated with the AA genotype compared to other genotype groups.

Sekizawa and colleagues published their study in American Journal of Medical
Genetics Part B - Neuropsychiatric Genetics (Childhood-onset schizophrenia and tryptophan hydroxylase gene polymorphism. Am J Med Genet Part B, 2004;128B(1):24-26).