Depression
Study Examines Unhealthy Behaviors in Response to Stress
When people are under chronic stress, they tend to smoke, drink, use drugs and overeat to help cope with stress. These behaviors trigger a biological cascade that helps prevent depression, but they also contribute to a host of physical problems that eventually contribute to early death. That is the claim of University of Michigan social scientist James S. Jackson and colleagues in an article published in the May 2010 issue of the American Journal of Public Health. The theory helps explain a long-time epidemiological puzzle: why African Americans have worse physical health than whites but better psychiatric health.
Learn more about Study Examines Unhealthy Behaviors in Response to Stress
Resilience Factor Low in Mice with Depression
Scientists have discovered a mechanism that helps to explain resilience to stress, vulnerability to depression and how antidepressants work. The new findings, in the reward circuit of mouse and human brains, have spurred a high tech dragnet for compounds that boost the action of a key gene regulator there, called deltaFosB.
Learn more about Resilience Factor Low in Mice with Depression
Changing Way of Thinking is Key to Battling Depression
Moderate to severely depressed clients showed greater improvement in cognitive therapy when therapists emphasized changing how they think rather than how they behave, new research has found.
Learn more about Changing Way of Thinking is Key to Battling Depression
Telephone Therapy Almost as Effective as Face-to-Face Therapy for Depression
Treating clinical depression on the telephone is nearly as effective as face-to-face consultations, a new Brigham Young University study has found. The trial run included 30 people newly diagnosed with major depression. Instead of eight scheduled visits to the clinic, the participants covered the same material during a series of phone calls with the therapist. Calls varied in length, ranging from 21 to 52 minutes. The patients did not receive antidepressant medication.
Learn more about Telephone Therapy Almost as Effective as Face-to-Face Therapy for Depression
Why Later-Life Depression is Harder to Treat
Scientists have found an important clue in the quest to understand why people who suffer from depression in later life are harder to treat and keep well in the long term. A study led by Toronto’s Baycrest has found that older adults with depression don’t respond normally to emotional stimuli, such as when they see happy, sad, or neutral faces.
Learn more about Why Later-Life Depression is Harder to Treat
Magnetic Stimulation May Be Successful as Depression Treatment
Some depressed patients who don’t respond to or tolerate antidepressant medications may benefit from a non-invasive treatment that stimulates the brain with a pulsing electromagnet, a study suggests. This first industry-independent, multi-site, randomized, tightly controlled trial of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) found that it produced significant antidepressant effects in a subgroup of patients, with few side effects.
Learn more about Magnetic Stimulation May Be Successful as Depression Treatment
Discrimination Leads to Depression in Minority Children
A new study found that minority children who are exposed to more racism and discrimination often experience more symptoms of depression. The study was presented May 2 at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Learn more about Discrimination Leads to Depression in Minority Children
People with Depression Eat More Chocolate as Symptoms Increase
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine have found that women and men eat more chocolate as depressive symptoms increase, suggesting an association between mood and chocolate. Results of this paper, co-authored by Beatrice Golomb, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine at UCSD School of Medicine, appears in the April 26 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine.
Learn more about People with Depression Eat More Chocolate as Symptoms Increase
African-American Men with Chronic Pain at Higher Risk for Depression
African-American men with chronic pain related to an accident, injury, illness, surgery, or other causes were more likely to experience depression, affective distress, and disability than white men with chronic pain, according to a new study by the University of Michigan Health System. The persistent pain black men experienced was more severe which might lead to greater disability, but the study by U-M researchers give clues to other factors that drive the downward spiral to depression and disability.
Learn more about African-American Men with Chronic Pain at Higher Risk for Depression
Patients Experience More Side Effects from Depression Medication Than Psychiatrists Admit
A study from Rhode Island Hospital shows that patients report side effects from medication for the treatment of depression 20 times more than psychiatrists have recorded in charts. The researchers recommend the use of a self-administered patient questionnaire in clinical practice to improve the recognition of side effects for patients in treatment. The study is published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, Volume 71, No. 4, now available online ahead of print.
Connect with an Elements Recovery Adviser
newsletter
