Topic: anxiety and stress responses

Tourette’s syndrome (TS) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) are neurodevelopmental disorders affecting ~0.6% of the total population. Although the full etiology of these disorders remains largely unknown, there are severe cases of TS and OCD known to be caused by a nonsense mutation in the Hdc gene coding for the enzyme responsible for histamine production with patients exhibiting lowered histamine levels. Both TS and OCD show strong social components where both stress and anxiety can facilitate as well as exacerbate symptoms, with an underlying cause remaining largely unknown. Therefore,