[exhypothesi]

Tangential: The story of the discovery of the cause of Narcolepsy is fascinating [1], [2], [3]

TL;DR: Narcolepsy is an autoimmune disorder caused by the destruction of the approximately 70,000 neurons that are responsible for producing the neurotransmitter orexin. [2]

A key piece of evidence was data analysis that showed a correlation between seasonal flu epidemic in China and subsequent new narcolepsy diagnoses. [1]

[1]: https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2011/08/study-draws-c...

[2]: https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2022/09/emmanuel-mign...

[3]: https://med.stanford.edu/content/dam/sm/narcolepsy/documents...

[larsiusprime]

(author here) Wait, we finally know the cause now? When did this happen? How did I miss this!!! How definitive is this finding?

[_the_inflator]

You didn’t know? Baffles me, but here is a link to E. Mignot. He alone is instrumental to the understanding of N. I expect him to receive the Noble Prize soon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmanuel_Mignot

He shares extremely deep insights and latest state of the art information on N in layman terms on YouTube.

Simply enter his name and enjoy his latest talks from 2023 and 2024 from the Wake up conference.

He discovered the mechanism behind N. And there is hope for a causal treatment for N1.

[exhypothesi]

It's easy to miss! The only reason I know is because of all of the research I've done into my Idiopathic Hypersomnia diagonsis. Mignot is well-respected because of his research.

It seems it's possible to get it from hypocretin deficiency via other routes like brain trauma, but they are confident enough to put this explanation in the DSM-5:

> Narcolepsy-cataplexy nearly always results from the loss of hypothalamic hypocretin (orexin)-producing cells, causing hypocretin deficiency (less than or equal to one-third of control values, or 110 pg/mL in most laboratories). Cell loss is likely autoimmune, and approximately 99% of affected individuals carry HLA-DQBl06:02 (vs. 12%-38% of control subjects). Thus, checking for the presence of DQB106:02 prior to a lumbar puncture for evaluation of CSF hypocretin-1 immunoreactivity may be useful.

https://ia800900.us.archive.org/0/items/info_munsha_DSM5/DSM...

pg 374, par 4 (pg 409 if using a PDF reader).

[bgnn]

not a narcoleptic but I remember reading about this, particularly the narcolepsy cases after pandemrix vaccine (a flu vaccine) there was a stromng correlation between upper respiratory infections and narcolepsy. This wikipedia article has some links to these: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix

interesting to see several people here mentioned they got narcolepsy after this vaccine.