Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “depression”
Bipolar disorder is a mental health condition that causes extreme mood swings, from manic highs to depressive lows. It can be a difficult condition to diagnose, as the symptoms can overlap with other conditions, such as depression, anxiety, ADHD, etcetera. A new study from the University of Cambridge suggests that some day a blood test could help to diagnose bipolar …
Depression is a common mental illness that affects millions of people worldwide. It can cause a wide range of symptoms, including sadness, fatigue, difficulty concentrating, and changes in appetite. Depression can also have a significant impact on a person’s quality of life. One way to treat depression is with medication. Antidepressants are a type of medication that can help to …
A study of 15 population-based cohorts, totalling 56,351 individuals, suggests that there is a correlation between inflammation as measured by elevated C-reactive protein (CRP) and interleukin-6 (IL-6) and a specific sub-group of symptoms of depression. The inflammation cluster consisted of four physical symptoms: changes in appetite, felt everything was an effort, loss of energy, sleep problems; and one cognitive symptom: little …
Three different findings associated with insulin resistance and pre-diabetes are predictive of developing depression according to a study published online from the American Journal of Psychiatry. Study Summary MedPage Today (9/23/2021) writes that, “Three surrogate measures for insulin resistance all showed a significant link with developing a major depressive disorder [MDD] over a nine-year follow-up period,” researchers concluded. The 601-participant study …
Psychotherapies — particularly cognitive-behavioral approaches used as adjunctive treatments — can play a critical role in helping people with a history of depression avoid relapse. For many people, major depression is a chronic illness. Even when they are no longer depressed, people who have had several episodes of depression have to be concerned about a significant risk of a recurrence …
Why do depressed people make choices that are unlikely to be rewarded. And why aren’t they willing to make choices that are likely to be rewarded. In fact, why are depressed people less likely than people who are not depressed to choose to take an antidepressant, or begin psychotherapy, or follow the advice of a therapist? A meta-analysis of many …
What are the best strategies for using ketamine to treat major depression in the short term? Although we know that ketamine (and, now, esketamine) can be helpful we really don’t know that much about what strategy works best. The most commonly used ketamine infusion protocol is adapted from studies using ketamine to treat chronic pain. An article in the March …
Much has been written about risk factors for depression but we know less about depression resilience factors. Why do some people at high risk develop depression, while others do not. A study conducted at Stanford by Adina S. Fischer, MD PhD, and colleagues, suggests that increased regulation of limbic areas (the parts of the brain that are most directly involved in …
Understanding the neurobiology of depression involves more than just knowing about serotonin, we need to know how state and trait brain function in depression is different from brain functioning in those who have never had a major depression. State and trait are key concepts in understanding psychiatric conditions: state refers to those alterations in functioning that occur when someone is …
One of my patients asked me what the long term effects of ketamine are. She was particularly interested in long-term adverse effects. The last time I did a review of the literature I noted that there seem to be very little information available. This is not surprising with the psychiatric literature since ketamine and its use for chronic depression are …
