Om psychiatric illness’ [320]. This is a narrowly defined term for several reasons. First, it restricts organisms to their live state. Recent human data, however, shows that heat-inactivated microbes can influence immunity [321] and promote mental health (reduction of tension-anxiety) [322]. Second, it bypasses the notion of prevention and utility in those who might sit under diagnostic criteria (that is, well individuals or those who may not be suffering from an overt psychiatric illness, yet not in optimal mental health as the WHO see it). Third, the definition restricts to ingestion (that is, does not consider inhalation and/or cutaneous routes of influence [323]). Fourth, the term provides no obvious link to the basis of much of the discussion here in this review internal and external ecosystems. It could be argued that -biotic attached to the prefix eco- would be a better choice; however, that term is now firmly entrenched incommercial trademarked microbial products, and furthermore, it makes no reference to mental health specificity. The term eco-psychotropic may capture the broad lens from which this topic might be viewed. Eco-psychotropics include any microorganisms, or parts thereof, that can benefit human ecosystems and/or physiology in the promotion of mental health. This allows for both pharmaceuticaloriented discussions and wide-ranging dialogue whereby the deprivation of eco-psychotropics considers natural environments and more upstream attempts to address the environmental forces that push toward dysbiosis. Eco-psychotropics could be living and non-living microbes carried within fermented foods; yet they may also be defined as the microbial agents that transform foods during fermentation such that they (the food items) are more capable of promoting mental health [160]. Activities such as community gardening [324], or spending time in natural environments [164], may place one in contact with eco-psychotropics. Patents, broad intellectual property claims, and commercial interests could easily direct the gut-brain-microbiota research juggernaut toward single microbe/microbial product solutions. The enthusiasm of the psychopharmacologist who PubMed ID:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26080418 might view encapsulated products as a microbial fluoxetine or alprazolam is understandable. Nonetheless, if such directed developments in research are viewed distinctly from glaring environmental factors (socioeconomic, ecological, marketing forces, and otherwise), it might overestimate the DS5565MedChemExpress DS5565 potential value of therapeutic outcomes, particularly in the most vulnerable. There seems little question that environmental factors are upstream and modifiable variables on the course toward sub-threshold and diagnosable mental health disorders. There is no evidence, at least in North America, that the rates of psychological distress are declining [325,326]. Given that medication and psychotherapy interventions provide only modest benefit, and estimated value may be over-inflated by publication bias [327-333], a new frontier of therapeutic hope, one that might act in synergy with first-line interventions, is most welcome. Emerging studies in the clinical setting will undoubtedly help to provide much needed evidence to guide policy and practice [334]. The young science of the microbiome-brain connection has established that microbes matter. If this area of research is to fulfill all of its promise, there must surely be a turn toward the exploration of its relevancy within socioeconomic and other enviro.
