A prospective cohort study in the US revealed that greater depressive symptoms were associated with worse episodic memory, smaller cerebral volume, and silent infarcts. The study included 1,111 stroke-free older adults with an average age of 71 between 2003 and 2008, 52% were Caribbean Hispanic. 22% of participants had greater […]
A genome-wide association meta-analysis identified 44 independent and significant loci associated with major depression. The analysis was based in 135,458 cases and 344,901 controls. Lower educational attainment and higher body mass were putatively causal, whereas major depression and schizophrenia reflected a partly shared biological etiology. All humans carry lesser or […]
A cohort study in the US suggested prenatal selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) exposure was associated with changes in fetal brain structure and activity, particularly in brain regions critical to emotional processing. The study included 98 infants: 16 with in utero SSRI exposure, 21 with in utero untreated maternal depression […]
Antidepressants have helped millions of people ease depression and anxiety, but they are not harmless. Many people stop the medications without significant trouble. Some people have significant withdrawal symptoms, and make tiny reductions over a long period of time may help to quit. The drugs initially were approved for short-term […]
A systematic review and network meta-analysis concluded that all 21 antidepressants were more efficacious than placebo in adults with major depressive disorder. Smaller differences between active drugs were found when placebo-controlled trials were included in the analysis, whereas there was more variability in efficacy (response rate) and acceptability (treatment discontinuations […]
A transcriptomic profiling analysis revealed that there were shared and distinct gene-expression patterns across five major psychiatric disorders—autism (ASD), schizophrenia (SCZ), bipolar disorder (BD), depression (MDD), and alcoholism (AAD)—compared with matched controls. Brain transcriptomes—a quantitative, genome-wide molecular phenotype—were performed using 700 cerebral cortical samples from subjects with ASD (n = […]
A 20-year cohort analysis of medical records in the UK revealed that blood pressure (BP) decreased for more than a decade before death in patients dying at 60 years and older. The analysis included 46 634 participants dying aged at least 60 years (51.7% female; mean age at death 82.4 years), […]
An international consortium showed that patients with depression and increased appetite and/or weight (A/W) carried a higher number of genetic risk variants for body mass index (BMI) and levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) and leptin. Data sets were drawn from case-control, cohort, and population-based studies, with established psychiatric diagnoses and […]
According to Dr. Mark Hyman, the problem with migraines is to just treat the symptoms, not the causes. The most important causes of migraines are food allergy/bowel and gut imbalances, chemical triggers, hormonal imbalances, magnesium deficiency, and mitochondrial imbalances. Food allergy/bowel and gut imbalances may be treated with an elimination […]
The American Heart Association scientific statement systematically reviewed data on the potential benefits of meditation on cardiovascular risk. Neurophysiological and neuroanatomical studies demonstrate that meditation can have long‐standing effects on the brain, which provide some biological plausibility for beneficial consequences on the physiological basal state, physiological responses, and on cardiovascular […]