Major Depressive Disorder

Small, "naturalistic" study shows treatment with desvenlafaxine produces high rates of symptom improvement and remission with low rates of adverse events in patients with major depressive disorder.

Teasing out relevant the relationship among risk factors, comorbidities, and migraine is challenging but critical for optimal migraine treatment.

Although the concept of delivering chronic pain care through multidisciplinary clinics is less than half a century old, John Loeser, MD, believes the model has already surpassed its peak in the United States, mainly due to financial reasons.

A hormone known as IGF-1 may serve as the link between depression and memory loss in older adults.

Depression in preschoolers can lead to depression later in childhood, according to research published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Psoriatic arthritis is often associated with sleep disturbances, depression, and other comorbidities that can adversely affect a patient's ability to perform activities of daily living.

Young fathers are at risk of developing depression during their children's formative years, a study published in Pediatrics concluded.

Survey results show that surgeons still have a long way to go in recognizing how psychological factors can impact the success of back surgeries.

Researchers have discovered an association between depression and employment status in people with multiple sclerosis, according to a study published in Functional Neurology.

Sometimes, chronic pain patients intentionally magnify or downplay their physical and mental symptoms during office visits. Despite that fact, little attention in the clinical setting is paid to underlying motives for positively or negatively biased self-reports.

Even if a chronic pain patient had been taking opioid medications exactly as prescribed, it would still be possible for the patient to experience negative cognitive and emotional responses to dose tapering that could amplify sensory pain and lead to opioid addiction.

When encouraging and supporting patients to quit smoking, varenicline is unlikely to increase the risk of neuropsychiatric adverse events such as suicide, depression, and aggression, even in patients with pre-existing psychiatric illness.

Although fibromyalgia lacks an effective standardized treatment, one part of the problem is the condition's diverse constellation of symptoms that include chronic widespread pain, fatigue, and even depression.

For patients who emerge from epilepsy surgery seizure-free, the complex relationship between depression, anxiety, and seizure control does not guarantee better quality of life.

Researchers from Finland find high depressive burden is associated with greater disability from the time of lumbar spinal stenosis surgery, including the 5-year point.

This review looks at the important problem of depression in patients with cardiovascular disease and presents useful information for all physicians.

Polyethylene glycol in conjunction with fiber supplementation is an effective treatment for occasional constipation in patients with irritable bowel syndrome.

While numerous patients require psychiatric interventions before and immediately after surgery, a new report addresses a different psychological process that can occur months or even years later: major quality-of-life (QOL) perception changes related to dramatic weight loss.

Several factors should be considered when choosing a medication and dosing schedule for this depressed adult male who reports being "very sensitive" to medication and expresses particular concern about being either sedated or "revved up" from an antidepressant.

In addition to treating episodes of major depression, Brintellix (vortioxentine) has demonstrated superiority to placebo on measures of cognitive function in adult patients with major depressive disorder (MDD).

Results from animal models of depression and a human clinical trial show that enhancing, instead of blocking, the NMDA glutamate receptor can cause antidepressant-like effects.

Within a year of their diagnosis, nearly half of all first-line drug-treated MDD patients were also treated with a second-line therapy, a new study finds. Cymbalta leads the market in second-line therapy, used individually or as a combination, and Abilify is the leading atypical antipsychotic.

The risk for depression exists in the years prior to menopause, but declines as a woman approaches her final menstrual period (FMP) and decreases even further after FMP, according to one study.

Among those with mental disorders, left-handed patients are more likely to be diagnosed with psychotic conditions like schizophrenia than mood disorders like depression.

Evidence shows that interventional approaches such as transcranial magnetic stimulation, electroconvulsive therapy, deep brain stimulation, and bright light therapy, coupled with mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, can be an effective part of treatment for major depressive disorder.

Although we have made great advances in understanding the genetic components of psychiatric illness, caution is essential when applying information from genetic testing to the selection of treatment in clinician practice.

Presentation at the 2013 NEI Psychopharmacology Congress noted potential "red flag" symptoms and events that indicate increased risk of bipolar depression, and discussed several medication options for effectively managing this mental health disorder.

Planning and preparation prior to a disaster, developing networks of contacts with other medical personnel and facilities, avoiding overburdening medical staff and personnel in the aftermath of a disaster, and effectively treating PTSD and other mental health disorders are the keys to disaster preparedness.

One treatment-resistant depression patient's response to over-the-counter cough medicine led Steven P. Levine, MD, to study the mechanism and effects of dextromethorphan in depression.

People with migraines are at twice the risk of depression as people without migraine headaches, particularly those under age 30, according to a new Canadian study.