Journal of affective disorders
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Comparative Study
Cognitive function after clinical remission in patients with melancholic and non-melancholic depression: a 6 month follow-up study.
Cognitive symptoms are core symptoms with an impact on functioning in depression. Remission is considered as the main objective of the management and treatment of depression. This study was aimed to compare cognitive performance between melancholic (MelD) and non-melancholic depression (NMelD) and to determine whether these cognitive alterations remain after clinical remission. ⋯ Patients with MelD do not improve cognitive performance despite clinical remission compared with remitted NMelD patients. The persistence of some cognitive dysfunctions in MelD remitted patients could represent a trait marker of a different depressive subtype and not be secondary to disease severity.
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In April 2011, a post-election violent conflict in northern Nigeria led to resettlement of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in a camp in Kaduna, the worst affected state. We set out to determine the prevalence of depression among the IDPs. We also determined socio-demographic and other correlates of depression among the IDPs. ⋯ IDPs living in Hajj camp in Kaduna, northern Nigeria developed post-conflict probable depression and definite depression. Female gender, experienced beating and comorbid diagnosis of PTSD were independent predictors of probable depression among the IDPs, while IDPs that were unemployed or retired had more of definitive depression.
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Voxel-based morphometry (VBM) has demonstrated structural brain changes between patients with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) and healthy individuals. The initial response to antidepressants is crucial to predict prognosis in the treatment of MDD. The aim of the present study was to investigate gray matter abnormalities predicting antidepressant responsiveness and the relationships between volumetric differences and clinical/cognitive traits in MDD patients. ⋯ Our findings suggest that the patients who responded poorly to antidepressants were morphologically and cognitively impaired, whereas the treatment responsive patients showed less structural changes and relatively preserved cognitive functions. The lingual gyrus may be a possible candidate region to predict antidepressant responsiveness and maintained cognition in MDD.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
The impact of anxious symptoms in the remission of depressive symptoms in a clinical trial for depression: follow-up of six months.
Studies show high comorbidity between anxiety disorder and depression. Little is known regarding how anxiety symptoms affect prognosis in depression treatment, suggesting the importance of studying the impact of anxiety symptoms in the treatment of depression. We evaluated the impact of anxiety symptoms in the remission of depressive symptoms after brief psychotherapies for depression. ⋯ The severity of anxiety symptoms did not compromise the treatment focused primarily on depressive symptoms.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Coping strategies as mediators of the effect of the START (strategies for RelaTives) intervention on psychological morbidity for family carers of people with dementia in a randomised controlled trial.
Family carers of people with dementia frequently become depressed or anxious. In observational studies, more emotion-focused and less dysfunctional coping predict fewer psychological symptoms, but no randomised controlled trial (RCT) has directly investigated emotion-focused coping as mediator of effectiveness of a successful psychological intervention. We hypothesised that emotion-focused coping would mediate the START psychological intervention׳s effects in an RCT. We tested whether mediated effects were moderated by severity of baseline symptoms. ⋯ START benefited family carers both in preventing and treating psychological morbidity, through different mechanisms of action. The most psychologically distressed carers increased their emotion-focused coping and did not decrease their dysfunctional coping, while others benefited but not through this mechanism.