Researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center, working with mice, showed how the body’s own natural stress hormone can help lastingly decrease the fearful response associated with reliving a traumatic memory.

Days after experiencing a traumatic event – a mild electrical shock – mouse in the study still showed a fearful response when re-exposed to the place where it happened, a condition that could be a model for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in humans. But mice receiving the hormone corticosterone at the time they relived the event experienced a significant drop in that fear.

According to Dr. Craig Powell, senior author of the study, corticosterone enhances new memories that compete with the fearful memory thereby decreasing its negative emotional significance. When an animal or human is exposed to or relives an aversive scenario, a process called extinction creates a competing memory.

From Bio-Medicine:

“We’re not erasing memories,” said Dr. Robert Greene, professor of psychiatry at UT Southwestern and another author of the study. “What the steroid does is attenuate the fear memory by helping the mice to learn that these contexts should no longer be perceived as dangerous.”

This study focused on a mechanism called extinction, in which a memory gradually diminishes, but can be re-established by a small reminder of the original event.

“Our studies show that glucocorticoids work specifically to enhance the extinction of fear memory, as opposed to other mechanisms affecting recall, such as eliminating the memory entirely,” said Dr. Greene. “This provides a proof of principle, and is an essential step in advancing this therapeutic approach.”

A UT Southwestern study is now under way in collaboration with the Dallas VA Medical Center with veterans suffering from PTSD to see if receiving a stress hormone while reliving their memories can reduce their disabling fear responses to their traumatic memories.

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As per a research with mice conducted by the UT Southwestern Medical Center, natural stress hormone of the body can help in lastingly reducing the fearful response attached with a traumatic memory.

It was revealed by Dr. Craig Powell, Senior Author and Assistant Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry at UT Southwestern that when Corticosterone was administered to the mice, new memories were enhanced to compete with the fearful traumatic memories with an aim to reduce the negative emotional significance of traumatic memories.

From Bio-Medicine.Org:

Days after experiencing a traumatic event – a mild electrical shock – mice in the study still showed a fearful response when re-exposed to the place where it happened, a condition that could be a model for post-traumatic stress disorder in humans. But mice receiving the hormone corticosterone at the time they “relived” the event experienced a significant drop in that fear.

“Corticosterone appears to enhance new memories that compete with the fearful memory thereby decreasing its negative emotional significance,” said Dr. Craig Powell, senior author and assistant professor of neurology and psychiatry at UT Southwestern. “When an animal or human is exposed to or relives an aversive scenario, a process called extinction creates a competing memory.”

“We’re not erasing memories,” said Dr. Robert Greene, professor of psychiatry at UT Southwestern and another author of the study. “What the steroid does is attenuate the fear memory by helping the mice to learn that these contexts should no longer be perceived as dangerous.”

The study had its focus on a mechanism known as extinction, in which memory diminishes on a gradual basis and can be reestablished with a small reminder of the original event. It was also found that glucocorticoids work to increase extinction of the feared memory in a specific manner. The new findings are seen as an essential step in advancing this therapeutic approach as per Dr. Greene.

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