Purple Tablets Asks... I'm a female of child-bearing age… who has been diagnosed as Bipolar II. The message that the different doctors have given me so far has been "don't get pregnant." (In fact, one offended me so much with how she delivered this message that I cancelled my follow-up appointment and got a new psychiatrist!)

Results of a recent study published in the September 30, 2008 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggest that a relatively common gene mutation may protect people from ever developing bipolar disorder. The study, entitled “A common variant in the 3′UTR of the GRIK4 glutamate receptor gene affects transcript abundance and protects against bipolar disorder,” suggests that a missing section of DNA in GRIK4 gene provides the protection.

A study published in this month's General Archives of Psychiatry entitled "Advancing Paternal Age and Bipolar Disorder," reports that children of older fathers have a higher risk of developing bipolar disorder than children of younger fathers. This is a large study, and the data are quite strong. Fathers age 40 and older show some increased risk of having a child with bipolar disorder, but the risk really grows with fathers ages 55 and older.

Recently, the NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health) distributed a press release entitled "Largest Study of Its Kind Implicates Gene Abnormalities in Bipolar Disorder." According to the press release, this "largest genetic analysis of ...

In Part I of this two-part series, we examined the role that genetics likely plays in the onset of bipolar disorder and learned that genetics contributes up to 80%, with environmental factors contributing about 20% or more. (This means that if someone has bipolar disorder, the cause of it is 75-80% due to genetics. It does not mean an individual in a family with a history of bipolar has a 75-80% chance of developing it. See Part I for statistics on the inheritability of bipolar.) It appears that for most people there needs to be some environmental factors that "turn on" the genes responsible for one's vulnerability to bipolar disorder. Many of these environmental triggers may occur early in life and may include things such as:

Although doctors and research scientists seem obsessed with mapping the human genome and identifying possible genetic links to every affliction from Alzheimer's to zits, it's parents and children who tend to be most concerned about bipolar disorder and heredity. Parents often ask me how likely it is that their children will develop bipolar disorder if someone in the family has it. And one of the biggest sources of anxiety for children of parents with bipolar is whether they will eventually "get it."