Why do sz's smoke so much?

[Dreamscape]

Smoking, schizophrenia linked by alterations in brain nicotine signals

Schizophrenia is associated with increased rates and intensity of tobacco smoking. A growing body of research suggests that the relationship between schizophrenia and smoking stems, in part, from an effort by patients to use nicotine to self-medicate symptoms and cognitive impairment associated with the disease. A new study, published in the current issue of Biological Psychiatry, sheds light on this hypothesis. The authors found that the level of nicotine receptors in the brain was lower in schizophrenia patients than in a matched healthy group. Further, smoking, which is known to increase the levels of receptors for nicotine in the brain, had this effect in both groups, although was blunt…