- Precision functional MRI mapping reveals distinct connectivity patterns for depression associated with traumatic brain injury Science
- Redefining Depression: TBI Affective Syndrome Discovered Neuroscience News
- Depression after a brain injury is a distinct condition, study finds. That could change how it’s treated. AOL
- Why depression after traumatic brain injury is distinct — and less likely to respond to standard treatment STAT
- Abnormal Brain Folding a Biomarker for Major Depressive Disorder Neuroscience News
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Tag Archives: depression
National, State-Level, and County-Level Prevalence Estimates of Adults Aged ≥18 Years Self-Reporting a Lifetime Diagnosis of Depression — United States, 2020 | MMWR – CDC
- National, State-Level, and County-Level Prevalence Estimates of Adults Aged ≥18 Years Self-Reporting a Lifetime Diagnosis of Depression — United States, 2020 | MMWR CDC
- Nearly 1 in 5 US adults have been diagnosed with depression and the prevalence varies dramatically by state, CDC report finds CNN
- CDC: A snapshot of Long Island, nation’s depression bout Newsday
- Brazos Valley reporting higher rates of depression than national and state average KBTX
- New CDC study says depression rates in the U.S. varies on where you live CBS Philadelphia
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Sen. John Fetterman’s hospitalization for depression after his stroke raises questions about the connection. Here’s what we know – CNN
- Sen. John Fetterman’s hospitalization for depression after his stroke raises questions about the connection. Here’s what we know CNN
- Senator John Fetterman could remain hospitalised for more than a month to treat ‘severe’ depression The Independent
- Fetterman Could Be Hospitalized For More Than A Month, Report Says Forbes
- Fetterman’s Hospitalization Is Reminder Media Lied To Get Him Elected | Opinion Newsweek
- Sen. John Fetterman Is Expected To Return To Work After Treatment for Depression, Aides Say Vanity Fair
- View Full Coverage on Google News
The link between our food, gut microbiome and depression
That’s slowly changing. The largest analysis of depression and the gut microbiome to date, published in December, found several types of bacteria notably increased or decreased in people with symptoms of depression.
“This study provides some real-life evidence that you are what you eat,” says study author Andre Uitterlinden, who researches genetics at Erasmus Medical Centre in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
Or to be exact, how you feel is closely related to what you consume.
The gastrointestinal system has been featured in brain research for centuries. In the early 1800s, John Abernethy, a popular London physician, held that “gastric derangement” was the root of all mental disorders.
And gastrointestinal symptoms often are reported in people with psychiatric illness. Weight and appetite changes are common among people with depression, from adolescence to older age. Anxiety has been tied to a heightened risk of nausea, heartburn, diarrhea and constipation. The link between food and mood is there even when we reach for macaroni and cheese to comfort us during a stressful time.
Interest in the gut-brain axis has had a resurgence in the past 20 years. A host of studies has pointed to a connection between the microbiota living in our intestinal tract, and our minds, including our memory, mood and cognitive skills.
Such research has spawned an industry of probiotics, prebiotics and fermented everything. Scientific names like bacteroidetes and lactobacillus, two of the most common bacteria found in healthy humans, have become household terms.
The health trend has gotten a bit ahead of the evidence. Most of the studies linking depression and the gut, for example, have been in animals and studies involving human participants have been small.
Still, the evidence thus far shows a link between the two. In one noteworthy study, entitled “Transferring the Blues,” bacteria-free rats given fecal samples from humans diagnosed with major depression became anxious and disinterested in pleasurable activities. Their metabolism of tryptophan, a chemical connected to depression, changed. But the mechanics behind the microbe-mood pathway — and which bacteria matter — has been harder to uncover.
Bacteria that predict depressive symptoms
This new study moves that needle, largely because of its size. The investigators, led by Najaf Amin, who researches population health at Oxford University, analyzed data from the Rotterdam Study, a decades-long effort to understand the health of the local population.
Amin and her colleagues focused specifically on a phase of this study that included fecal sample collection from more than 1,000 individuals. These participants also provided a self-report on depression using a 20-item assessment.
The researchers parsed the data for associations between the bacteria populations in the fecal samples with scores from the depression assessment. They then conducted the same tests using data from another 1,539 Dutch citizens encompassing a range of ethnicities. (Validating the findings from one large group in a second large group makes them particularly reliable.)
The analysis revealed 16 types of bacteria that the authors called “important predictors” of depressive symptoms to varying degrees. For example, the study, published in Nature Communications, found a depletion of Eubacterium ventriosum among people who were depressed. Interestingly, this same decrease has been spotted in microbiome studies of traumatic brain injury and obesity, both of which are tied to depression, supporting the notion that this species of bacteria has something to do with this mood disorder.
The study authors also took a stab at answering the big question: Do any particular gut flora cause depression? It’s a tricky proposition. Major depression disorder has been linked to more than 80 different genetic mutations and all of these connections are weak.
“There’s no gene that causes depression,” said Jane Foster, professor of psychiatry at UT Southwestern, who studies the gut-brain connection and was not involved with this study.
Technology to clearly establish causation does not exist. So the researchers turned to a crafty statistical calculation known as Mendelian randomization, which can tease out the direction of an influence when the gene-disease connection is strong. That’s not the case with depression, which makes the calculation here interesting but not necessarily useful.
Still, the calculation did point to an abundance of one bacteria — Eggerthella — in people with depression as a possible cause of depressive symptoms. The finding didn’t surprise Amin.
Eggerthella, she notes, “is found to be consistently increased in abundance in the guts of depressed individuals.” The result provides evidence that changes in the gut flora may trigger depressive symptoms. “We cannot exclude our own DNA as a contributing source,” Foster said. “It’s a combination of the DNA you were born with, your experiences in life to date, and your environment.”
Whether the flora cause the depression or vice versa may be beside the point. “Causation isn’t a one-way street,” said Jack Gilbert, who directs the Microbiome and Metagenomics Center at the University of California at San Diego, and was not involved with the new study.
Rather, the gut and brain cycle together. For instance, it appears that comfort eating after a stressful event can change the microbial community in our intestines, which in turn exacerbates depressed feelings.
What is clear, Gilbert said, is that when we are depressed, the gut microbiome is often missing beneficial flora. “If we can add those elements back in,” Gilbert said, “maybe we can re-energize that cycle.”
Changing your diet to improve your mood
This is where diet enters the picture. An individual who does not consume enough fiber, for example, may experience a decrease in butyrate-producing bacteria, Amin said, leading to stress and inflammation and, potentially, symptoms of depression.
It may feel like a letdown that the message from all this work is to eat plenty of fruits and vegetables and not so much excess sugar. But the sheer amount of research confirming the power of a healthy gut has become undeniable for even the most hard-bitten skeptic, Gilbert included.
“When the evidence points to the fact that eating healthy, doing a little bit of exercise and taking mindfulness breaks can have benefits, we should probably listen to that data,” he says.
Research is slowly illuminating exactly how bacteria talk to the brain. For example, many of them produce short-chain fatty acids such as butyrate and acetate, which influence brain activity. Others generate a chemical called GABA, deficits of which are linked to depression.
This progress means that diet may not be the only way to improve our gut colonies. The use of probiotics to prevent and treat depression could become more of an exact science, leading eventually to effective alternatives to antidepressants, which, Gilbert points out, still carry a stigma in many communities.
And profiling the bacteria could help identify people at risk for depression, notes Foster. Her lab is searching for signs among gut flora indicating what drug is most likely to benefit someone suffering from depression.
All this research has convinced Uitterlinden that adopting a gut-improving diet comes with just one significant side effect. “You’ll get happier,” he said.
Do you have a question about healthy eating? Email EatingLab@washpost.com and we may answer your question in a future column.
Could taking a depression pill prevent lasting agony of shingles?
Sitting in A&E, with piercing pain radiating across his forehead and his left eye, David Hadfield clutched his head, struggling to work out what was going wrong.
The answer emerged during his hour-long wait at Manchester Eye Hospital. A ‘bumpy, burning rash’ began to develop down one side of his forehead, just above his left eye and eyebrow, a symptom which immediately ‘gave the game away’ to doctors examining him: he had shingles.
‘I was absolutely astounded,’ says David, 76, who lives in Alderley Edge in Cheshire. ‘I didn’t know much about the condition, but I certainly didn’t think it could affect your face or eyes. It came out of nowhere.’
Four months on — six weeks of which was spent in a darkened room to prevent light aggravating his sensitive eye — David was still in agony and relying on large doses of powerful painkillers.
Professor Pickering and other researchers are launching a major trial — the Athena Shingles Study — treating newly diagnosed cases with amitriptyline (a type of antidepressant)
‘You’d think that when the rash goes, which it did after about ten days, the pain would go away, too,’ says David.
‘But it has just carried on and on. There were days when I thought my eye socket was on fire because the pain was so bad. You start to think: will it ever go away?’
Shingles is a common infection caused by the reactivation of varicella zoster, the virus that triggers chickenpox. It can lie dormant in the body for years, but if your immune system is compromised the virus can escape, travelling along nerves to the skin, producing the signature blister-like rash.
While the visible signs of the virus tend to clear within a week or so, around 14 per cent of patients are left with severe nerve pain, known as post-herpetic neuralgia, which can last for up to a year and may even become permanent.
‘The problem is that there aren’t any good treatments for shingles pain,’ explains Tony Pickering, a professor of neuroscience and anaesthesia at Bristol University.
‘And, unfortunately, I have seen patients who even 20 years down the line are still suffering with some kind of pain.’
It’s why Professor Pickering and other researchers at Bristol, Oxford, Southampton and Warwick universities, are launching a major trial — the Athena Shingles Study — treating newly diagnosed cases with amitriptyline (a type of antidepressant that at lower doses is used to treat nerve pain) to try to prevent post-herpetic neuralgia.
A small study in 1997 suggested taking amitriptyline early may help, but the researchers say this new study will be the largest on the subject.
For 80 per cent of those who catch chickenpox, the virus resides in the body without causing problems, explains Dr Ashish Gulve, a consultant in pain medicine at The James Cook University Hospital in Middlesbrough and medical advisor to the Shingles Support Society.
‘However, in some people, perhaps decades later, the virus is reactivated, possibly because of advancing age — shingles is most common in the over-70s — or due to a compromised immune system which makes it harder to fight infection.’
Diseases and treatments that weaken the immune system, such as type 2 diabetes and chemotherapy, can also allow the virus to become active.
(Being exposed to chickenpox again shouldn’t be a risk. In fact, research published in the BMJ in 2020 found that adults exposed to a child with chickenpox are around 30 per cent less likely to develop shingles for up to 20 years, possibly because re-exposure to the virus boosts immunity to shingles.)
A small study in 1997 suggested taking amitriptyline early may help, but the researchers say this new study will be the largest on the subject
Shingles can appear in any nerve in the body and, once the virus is reactivated, the affected nerve starts sending pain signals even if there is no rash.
‘The hypersensitivity can be so acute that some patients can’t even touch the affected area,’ says Dr Gulve. ‘Even a cold breeze can set off pain.’
David’s problem began when he woke one morning with a headache unlike any he’d had before. Two days of taking ibuprofen had no effect and he soon felt an agonising, burning pain around his left eye.
After his diagnosis, David, a former business executive, was prescribed gabapentin, which is a medication used to treat nerve pain, as well as antivirals.
David’s vision was unaffected, but the pain in his eye, forehead and eye socket was ‘terrible’.
‘I’m a very busy and sociable person, but overnight I became someone who had to sit at home with the curtains closed all day, covering my bad eye with my hand as a way of trying to head off this awful pain,’ he says.
‘It literally felt like my eye and my forehead were burning. It also felt like something was sticking in my eye, which had become bulbous and swollen.’
At one point, David was taking 18 tablets a day.
Professor Pickering says ‘throwing the kitchen sink’ at post-herpetic neuralgia may not help and the drugs themselves have potential side-effects.
‘That is why we are interested in prevention with amitriptyline,’ he adds.
Dr Gulve says the lack of effective treatments for the long-term pain means it’s important that patients seek help quickly if they suspect it might be shingles as antivirals can stop the virus replicating.
The virus damages nerves, and the longer it’s around then the more damage it can do, says Professor Pickering.
‘The pain is the result of this damage to nerve cells. Therefore, if antivirals reduce the replication of the virus and speed its elimination, they should hasten the end of the shingles and reduce the risk of long-term pain.
‘However, this has not been convincingly demonstrated in studies, possibly because of the damage already done by the virus before people go to their GP — so we would encourage patients to go to their GP as early as possible.’
One study, updated in the Journal of Medical Virology in 2021, found that only 54 per cent of patients received antiviral treatment within 72 hours. Antivirals need to be given in the first few days of infection.
‘A key issue is lack of recognition,’ says Matthew Ridd, a professor of primary healthcare at Bristol University and one of the leaders of the Athena study.
‘Patients may not realise they have a problem that needs to be seen quickly, or that the rash is connected to also feeling under the weather, or other symptoms such as a headache,’ he says. That creates a delay in diagnosis and treatment.
Shingles presents as a rash on one side of the body, and pain in the area may precede the rash — which won’t cross the midline,’ he says (in layman’s terms, the nerves run down the body, rather than across). ‘There might also be general malaise.’
As well as long-term pain, shingles can also lead to a raised risk of cardiovascular problems. The theory is the virus causes vascular changes which lead to blockages in the blood vessels.
A study published by Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the U.S. in November found shingles was linked to an almost 30 per cent increased risk of heart attacks or strokes in those without previous cardiovascular problems.
There is no cure for shingles, but a vaccine, Zostavax, is available on the NHS to anyone in their 70s. But uptake rates in England dropped from 61.8 per cent of 70-year-olds in 2013/14 to 26.5 per cent in 2019/20, largely because of a lack of access to GPs during the pandemic.
‘If your GP hasn’t invited you to have it, ask for it,’ advises Marian Nicholson, director of the Herpes Viruses Association and Shingles Support Society.
Today, David is ‘slowly getting back to normal’.
But he adds: ‘I still have a burning sensation around my forehead and a feeling that something is sticking in my left eye. I wouldn’t wish what I’ve been through on anyone.’
The Athena trial is recruiting recently diagnosed patients: athena-study.bristol.ac.uk.
Dr Megan Rossi is away
Adventurer and TV presenter Bear Grylls, 48, answers our health quiz
Under the microscope
Adventurer and TV presenter Bear Grylls, 48, answers our health quiz
Interview by Louise Flind
Can you run up the stairs?
I can and I do! Training is a habit built over many years and takes the form of a body weight routine (25 pull-ups, 50 press-ups, 75 squats and 100 sit-ups) then a weights session every other day. On alternate days, I swim or play touch tennis and I do yoga weekly.
Get your five a day?
I do in terms of fruit but not veg. I’m sceptical about the benefits, to be honest. My diet was vegan/plant-based for years, until I got Covid pretty bad. I doubled down on loads of veg and celery and all that stuff in smoothies but my kidneys got really painful. Then my eldest son [now 19], who’d been struggling with his energy, skin and stomach, got help and was weaned back to great health by eating red meat, butter, eggs, fruit and honey, and cutting out bread, pasta and veg. I couldn’t believe the transformation, but the same happened to me and I’ve now embraced an ancestral/carnivore approach — predominantly grass-fed red meat and liver, rice, eggs and dairy, with fruit and honey to finish.
My diet was vegan/plant-based for years, until I got Covid pretty bad
Ever dieted?
Yes, but I’d be lean yet lose strength and was always hungry. Now I feel full every day, yet am fitter and leaner than ever [at 6ft, he weighs 12st 4lb].
Any vices?
Pina coladas and Dairy Milk chocolate (a square or two after meals). If I want the odd treat, that’s fine: you’ve got to live a little!
Family ailments?
My father died a few days after having a pacemaker fitted. He was 66. It was the worst moment of my life. The truth is he probably wasn’t active enough and thought eating margarine and no red meat was healthy, when actually he needed natural foods.
Worst illness/injury?
When I was 22, I broke my back when my parachute failed to open. I was lucky not to be paralysed, and spent a long time in military rehabilitation [he was in the 21 (Reserve) SAS]. It made me realise life is so precious, and I vowed to live with total commitment, energy and gratitude.
If I want the odd treat, that’s fine: you’ve got to live a little!
Pop any pills?
I take Ancestral Supplements [his own range] which include a lot of the organs that are harder to eat in natural form, such as heart, lung, blood and bone marrow. They’re like nature’s best multivitamin.
Ever been depressed?
When Shara and I married [2000], we lost our fathers within a few months. I felt low but simple things helped: sunlight, cold water, good friends, sharing the struggles, being outside, training hard and setting goals.
What keeps you awake?
I worry about my 82-year-old mum because I know movement is so key to longevity but she is less mobile now.
Any phobias?
To this day, I feel the fear before I skydive. But never run from fears or they grow.
ancestralsupplements.com
Young women abandoning birth control pills for mental health
I started taking the birth control pill as a sophomore in high school to help with my acne. Most of my friends got prescriptions around then, too.
I never thought twice about birth control — let alone going off it — until the pandemic, when I had more time to consider the pill I popped every morning. I began wondering how taking artificial hormones every day was impacting how I think and feel.
Recently, after six years on it, I decided to stop taking the pill. But it isn’t just me. Many of my friends are independently doing the same, whether it’s driven by concern for their mental health, desire for something more natural — or curiosity about what the world looks like when you’re not in a hormonal fog.
For more and more Gen Z women, there’s an intuitive sense that hormonal birth control might be messing with us, and our brains. And research is backing it up, showing correlations between the pill and a decreased sex drive, as well as higher rates of depression and suicide, and even stress reactions similar to PTSD survivors.
Research psychologist Dr. Sarah Hill thinks so. In 2019, she published the book This is Your Brain on Birth Control: The Surprising Science of Women, Hormones, and the Law of Unintended Consequences after going off of the pill herself.
“It was going off of the pill and seeing how that changed me that inspired me to write the book,” Hill, who is a professor of social psychology at Texas Christian University, told The Post. “I had a lot more energy, and I was exercising and cooking again. Suddenly, I was interested in sex.”
Since then, Dr. Hill said, she’s noticed a “greater awareness of some of the side effects” of the pill that has potentially contributed to a slow but steady decline in prescriptions. Between 2002 and 2017, there was a 9% decrease in oral contraceptive use.
And, although more up to date numbers are yet to come in, doctors are anecdotally noting an increase in young women desiring a change.
“I have noticed that many patients prefer non-hormonal birth control,” Dr. Taraneh Shirazian, a gynecologist at NYU Langone Health and director of the Center for Fibroid Care, told The Post. “Many are keen on limiting their body’s exposure to outside hormones so that they can feel more natural and like themselves.”
This trend may be partly inspired by viral TikTok and YouTube videos discussing the pill’s side effects — and the early days of COVID.
“The pandemic allowed us to focus attention on our health,” Dr. Hill explained. “For women who were not in relationships and weren’t sexually active, it was an opportunity to break up with their birth control …They wanted to find out how they would think and feel and experience the world without it.”
Komi Frey, 30 of Albuquerque, decided to go off of the pill in 2021 after about six years of taking it. “I went off the pill primarily because I didn’t like the idea of ingesting exogenous hormones on a daily basis,” she told The Post. “I just had an instinctive aversion to that idea.”
It’s a sentiment Dr. Hill has noticed more and more.
“We are moving, culturally, toward a place where we’re recognizing that putting a bunch of chemicals in our body isn’t necessarily a great idea,” she said. “People are looking for more natural approaches.”
Dr. Hill’s research is shedding light on just how profoundly the birth control pill can impact women beyond the classic side effects like weight gain, blood clots and even stroke.
One of the most commonly reported psychological side effects of the pill is decreased sex drive. That’s because women on the pill have artificially high levels of progesterone, which Dr. Hill dubs “sexual anti-venom.” Research has revealed that taking oral contraceptives is associated with a decreased enjoyment of sex, on top of an already lowered libido.
But the pill may also impact partner selection, too. Researchers found that women on oral contraceptives prefer less masculine faces in potential partners. Women off the pill, meanwhile, have been found to subconsciously prefer the scent of men with higher testosterone.
It’s an experience Kennedie Khourie had herself. The 24-year-old Austin, Texas, resident decided to go off of the pill last spring after six years, she suspected her mental health was being adversely impacted.
Not only did Khourie feel “less hormonal and manic” after quitting, but she experienced entirely different feelings toward potential partners. “I’m not even attracted to the same people,” she told The Post. “People smell different to me. Men smell different to me.”
Amazingly, research reveals that the change in attraction is so pronounced that women who picked their partners while on the pill are more likely to experience diminished satisfaction with their romantic relationships when they go off of it.
But birth control’s impact on the brain goes beyond just sexual preferences. It’s impacting women’s experience of the world around them. According to Dr. Hill’s research, being on the pill may be associated with lower self-control and less perseverance.
It also affects the way women react to stress. While the body’s typical response to a stressful experience is the release of the hormone cortisol, women on the pill have a dulled — or completely absent — cortisol response.
As a result, they tend to have a diminished capacity to process negative emotions. In fact, this muted cortisol response looks a lot like that of someone suffering from PTSD.
According to Dr. Hill, “We should all be alarmed by the fact that the stress hormone profiles of women who are on the birth control pill look more like those belonging to trauma victims than they do like those belonging to otherwise healthy young women.”
Both Dr. Shirazian and Dr. Hill have noticed a generational change in attitudes about birth control, with Gen Z at the forefront of a new movement toward more natural, non-hormonal alternatives.
Dr. Shirazian thinks it is “part of a generational shift.” She said younger patients generally “want more natural products, less hormones and chemicals, and also want to use products that are environmentally friendly.”
“This generation of women is demanding they get information about what’s going into their body,” Dr. Hill said. “A younger generation of women are saying, ‘Hey, wait a minute. You can’t just tell me what to put in my body and expect me to blindly obey.’”
Laura Lear, 24 of Houston, Texas, went on the pill at the age of 20 — later than many of her friends — when her then-boyfriend and peers urged her to do so.
“I just fell into peer pressure,” she told The Post. “My friends were going on it, and I just decided, ‘Okay, if this is what everyone else is doing.’ It was so normal for kids at 13 or 14 to get on it because they had bad acne. It kind of became the cool thing to do, like, ‘Oh, I take my pill every day at 3 o’clock, let’s sync our timers together.’”
But this generation of young women who went on the pill before they were even sexually active may be shouldering unintended consequences. Research has revealed that going through adolescence on the pill is associated with measurable density differences in brain regions involved with memory and emotions.
It’s a discovery that doesn’t surprise Dr. Hill: “To be honest with you, I don’t know how anyone could predict anything other than that, because the puberty transition is when your brain is remodeling itself from its childlike phenotype into its adult version of itself. It’s hard to believe that, by some miracle, it wouldn’t affect brain development.”
Researchers also found birth control use during adolescence is associated with a “small but robust” increase in the risk of major depressive disorder later in life. Girls who start the pill early are disproportionately likely to be prescribed antidepressants and diagnosed with depression. And a study of half a million women in Denmark revealed early hormonal contraceptive use may even be associated with a tripled risk of suicide.
This risk of lifelong mental health issues and even suicide is not only startling, it’s been largely underreported despite how many young women continue to be prescribed hormonal birth control with little to no warnings.
“It seems to me that there is this belief that birth control as an issue facing women has been solved: We have the pills, and so what’s all the whining and fussing about?” Dr. Hill said. “Drug companies and others who could be investing in trying to find something better for us are mistaking the fact that so many women are on it for the fact that we don’t need something better.”
In fact, only 2% of revenue from birth control pill sales goes back into research and development. And more young women are taking notice.
“We as a society are losing trust in knowledge-producing institutions, including the medical field,” Frey observed. “We’ve realized that they’re often prone to political and financial pressures, as well as human limitations. The incentive system is somewhat warped.”
None of this is to say that the birth control pill hasn’t been an enormous net-positive for women.
Providing liberation through family planning has afforded women flexibility and independence: Females now outnumber males in the college-educated labor force. That’s perhaps why there’s some resistance, especially among older generations, to talking about the pill’s shortfalls.
“A lot of women are very protective of the birth control pill just simply because they can remember a time when these types of options weren’t available,” Dr. Hill noted. “They’re trying to make sure that these options continue to be protected for the latest generation of women.”
That protectiveness is more consequential now than ever, in the wake of Roe v. Wade being overturned.
“Going off the pill is especially scary because I cannot get pregnant,” Khourie, who lives in Texas where abortion is now banned, said. “The reversal of Roe just made it scarier, because I would have to jump through more hoops if something were to happen.”
Many women going off the pill are opting for non-hormonal options, like the copper IUD, diaphragms and — sharing the burden with men as well — condoms. Others, like Frey and Lear, who are both married, are tracking their ovulatory cycles and depending on natural family planning.
“I would like to see there be more normalization of women doing whatever is best for their own bodies,” Khourie said.
As Dr. Hill explained: “There’s no one size fits all answer for anything when it comes to something as complex as contraception.”
Friends of mom who strangled her three young kids to death battled with postpartum psychosis
Friends of a mother who murdered her three children while suffering with severe postpartum depression have banded together in support of her after the tragedy.
Those close to Lindsay Clancy, 32, have taken to social media to describe her as an extremely kind person who loved her children deeply – and to characterize her actions as being clearly driven by the ‘serious demons’ of her psychosis.
Many have shown their support and solidarity for Lindsay by changing their profile pictures to an image of a heart made up of smaller hearts, with the letters LAOL – standing for Lindsay’s Army of Love – written underneath.
Lindsay is accused of strangling her daughter Cora, five, son Dawson, three, and baby Callan, eight months. She is facing murder and assault charges, and is said to have been suffering severe post-natal depression at the time of the killings.
Lindsay with her husband Patrick, and two of their children. The couple had a third child, who died with his siblings after their mother attacked them in an apparent state of psychosis
Jeri Lyn, a friend of Lindsay’s said that the tragedy should serve as a reminder to the world about the dangers of postpartum depression
Kristen Gildersleeve took to Facebook to recall volunteering with Lindsay when they were classmates in high school.
She said that when she first heard the news about the killings she was horrified, but upon coming to understand postpartum depression (PPD) she came to understand the tragedy that happened.
‘I said PPD isn’t an excuse because I also suffered from it and I never had thoughts about harming my children and couldn’t fathom the thought of it,’ she wrote, recalling her initial reaction to the killings.
A graphic that people have been posting on social media to show support for Lindsay. LAOL stands for Lindsay’s Army of Love
But she said that after researching PPD she came to understand just how severely the hormone imbalances that can come after pregnancy can hurt a person’s mind.
‘I knew Lindsay from high school…we spent many hours together doing CNA clinical hours and she was such a kind, loving person,’ she wrote.
‘What I can say for sure is she was battling some serious demons, that nobody can understand if you’ve never experienced it yourself.
‘To all the people condemning her, I ask you to please look into postpartum psychosis and see if that changes your thoughts, even just a little bit.’
Another woman who knew Lindsay growing up, Jeri Lyn, recorded a video of herself speaking in support for the mother and saying that what happened was nothing more than a tragedy.
‘It just reminds you how precious life is, how important you mental health is, and more so how you never know what somebody else is going through,’ she said.
‘I feel for this woman, I feel for her babies, I feel for her family, anybody who is impacted by this tragic tragic situation. I never in a million years would have expected to read or see that, and my heat hurts, it hurts for those who are impacted by it.’
‘This morning I just cant stop reading it, I can’t put it into words, I can’t even make sense of it, and I’m so sad for it,’ Lyn added.
They discovered the three young children ‘unconscious’ upstairs ‘with obvious signs of trauma’ on Tuesday evening
Callan was initially the only child to survive the incident, but he died on Friday morning
Friend Christian McSharry remembered Lindsay and her children as ‘joyful.’
‘A young mother, loving her sweet children, making music in a safe circle of friends,’ she said of Lindsay.
She spoke out strongly about how she felt there needed to be more discussions about and awareness of PPD.
‘This needs to be talked about more and normalized so the many who do suffer from any postpartum illness feel safe to speak up,’ she wrote. ‘The work to make a mother feel safe needs to happen BEFORE the illness begins.’
Dawn Aducci, a friend and former coworker of Lindsay’s also spoke on her behalf, recalling Lindsay as ‘A woman, a Mother, a wife, a daughter, a nurse.’
‘I pray their two children who are now angels know that was NOT their Momma, the same mom who rocked them to sleep, wiped their tears, kissed scraped knees, and made silly faces for laughs- that was not their Momma that night,’ she wrote.
‘I pray for Lindsay as she eventually will surface from the depths of hell she was feeling inside only to find out she is in a new kind of hell…I pray she is given support throughout this horrific fog.’
Friends of the Clancy family have set up a GoFundMe to support Patrick and assist in paying for medical bills, funeral bills and legal bills.
Clancy, pictured with Cora as a baby, was a midwife at Massachusetts General Hospital
Investigators are probing if Lindsay, a midwife who was on leave from Massachusetts General Hospital, was suffering from postpartum psychosis.
She had written about her struggle with postpartum depression on her Facebook page just six weeks after the birth of Callan, who was born in May.
Her husband, Patrick Clancy, 34, gave searing insight into his ‘excruciating and relentless pain’ in a post on the family’s GoFundMe page, his first public remarks since the tragedy.
‘I want to ask all of you that you find it deep within yourselves to forgive Lindsay, as I have,’ Clancy wrote.
‘The real Lindsay was generously loving and caring towards everyone — me, our kids, family, friends, and her patients.
‘The very fibers of her soul are loving. All I wish for her now is that she can somehow find peace.’
Father Patrick Clancy was out for 25 minutes to grab takeout for his family when he found his wife, Lindsay, unconscious after dropping from their second-floor window. Inside their home, daughter Cora (left) and son Dawson (right) were dead
Tributes have been laid outside the home where the tragedy occurred, with balloons and flowers left by well-wishers piling up
Patrick found his wife lying unconscious outside their home at about 6pm Tuesday and called 911. He had ‘popped out for 25 minutes’ to collect a takeout order.
More than $690,000 had been raised by Saturday according to a GoFundMe page created for the family’s medical bills, funeral services, and legal help.
‘A lot of people have said they can’t imagine and they’re right, there’s absolutely nothing that can prepare you,’ Patrick wrote in the post on Saturday.
‘The shock and pain is excruciating and relentless. I’m constantly reminded of them and with the little sleep I get, I dream about them on repeat.’
Clancy pictured with her husband Patrick, 34, who called authorities after finding her lying unconscious outside their home on Tuesday evening
Her horrified husband, Patrick, 34, discovered Clancy lying unconscious outside their home when he returned from work at around 6pm and called 911
Patrick wrote about his wife Lindsay, whom he married in 2016 in Southington, Connecticut, according to an engagement announcement in the Scituate Mariner.
‘Our marriage was wonderful and diametrically grew stronger as her condition rapidly worsened,’ he wrote.
‘I took as much pride in being her husband as I did in being a father and felt persistently lucky to have her in my life.
‘I still remember the very moment I first laid eyes on her and can recall how overcome I was with the kind of love at first sight you only see in movies. It really didn’t take long before I was certain I wanted to marry her.’
Patrick talked about Lindsay’s dedication to being a nurse and a mother.
‘We mutually understood the reality that people can have bad days, but we stuck to the rule that when one of us got lost, the other was always there to bring them home, always,’ he wrote.
‘She loved being a nurse, but nothing matched her intense love for our kids and dedication to being a mother. It was all she ever wanted. Her passion taught me how to be a better father.’
He asked for forgiveness for Lindsay, as he said he has forgiven her. ‘I want to ask all of you that you find it deep within yourselves to forgive Lindsay, as I have,’ he wrote.
‘The real Lindsay was generously loving and caring towards everyone – me, our kids, family, friends, and her patients.’
Plymouth County District Attorney confirmed that Callan (above) died at a Boston area hospital on Friday morning
Last July, she wrote that six weeks after the child’s birth, she was feeling ‘dialed in’ and sought to focus on exercise, nutrition and her mindset, which she claimed ‘made all the difference.’
In 2020, she wrote online: ‘So unbelievably thankful for this family and life,’ along with doting images of her children.
Feelings of depression can be common after childbirth, but on rare occasions, they can lead to full postpartum psychosis.
In this extreme form of PPD, a mother can suffer from severe depression and hallucinations which can lead her to harm herself, her children, or both.
The hospital where Lindsay works said in a statement: ‘We are shocked and saddened to learn of this unthinkable tragedy. We extend our deepest sympathies to all those affected by these devastating events.’
Duxbury Police work at the scene where the two children were found dead. The third died later
Heartbreaking pictures show Cora, right and Dawson, left, smiling together. The siblings were pronounced dead at hospital
Lindsay Clancy will be arraigned on charges including two counts of homicide and three each for strangulation and assault and battery with a deadly weapon for the deaths of her two children.
It is expected that further charges will be added for the death of Callan.
Plymouth District Attorney Timothy Cruz said it appeared that they had all been strangled.
He said of the family: ‘I cannot begin to fathom the pain, the depths of pain they must be feeling.
‘This is an unimaginable, senseless tragedy, and it is an ongoing investigation.’
Cruz warned, ‘nobody’s here to speculate’, adding ‘we’re well aware of the fact that anybody charged with a criminal crime is presumed innocence until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.’
He wrapped up the conference by saying: ‘Certainly our hearts and condolences go up to the Clancy family.’
A Drug That Increases Dopamine Can Reverse the Effects of Inflammation on the Brain in Depression
Summary: Levodopa, a drug commonly prescribed for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease that increases dopamine in the brain was found to reverse the effects of neuroinflammation on the reward system and improve symptoms associated with depression.
Source: Emory University
An Emory University study published in Molecular Psychiatry shows levodopa, a drug that increases dopamine in the brain, has potential to reverse the effects of inflammation on brain reward circuitry, ultimately improving symptoms of depression.
Numerous labs across the world have shown that inflammation causes reduced motivation and anhedonia, a core symptom of depression, by affecting the brain’s reward pathways.
Past research conducted by the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Emory University School of Medicine has linked the effects of inflammation on the brain to decreased release of dopamine, a chemical neurotransmitter that regulates motivation and motor activity, in the ventral striatum.
In the study, researchers demonstrated that levodopa reversed the effects of inflammation on the brain’s functional connectivity in reward circuitry and anhedonia (inability to feel pleasure) in depressed individuals with higher C-reactive protein (CRP), a blood biomarker produced and released by the liver in response to inflammation.
Levels of inflammation can be easily measured by simple blood tests, like CRP, readily available in clinics and hospitals throughout the U.S.
The study included 40 depressed patients with a range of CRP levels from high to low who underwent functional brain scans on two visits after receiving in random order either placebo or levodopa, a drug often prescribed for disorders like Parkinson’s disease.
Levodopa improved functional connectivity in a classic ventral striatum to ventromedial prefrontal cortex reward circuit but only in patients with higher levels of CRP. This improvement in reward circuitry in depressed individuals with higher CRP also correlated with reduced symptoms of anhedonia after levodopa.
“This research demonstrates the translational potential for use of inflammation-related deficits in functional connectivity and could have important implications for the future investigations of precision therapies for psychiatric patients with high inflammation,” says principal investigator and senior author Jennifer C. Felger, Ph.D., associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, Emory School of Medicine.
Felger says the study findings are critical for two reasons. First, they suggest depressed patients with high inflammation may specifically respond to drugs that increase dopamine.
Second, Felger says these findings also provide additional evidence that functional connectivity in reward circuitry may serve as a reliable brain biomarker for the effects of inflammation on the brain.
“Moreover, as the effect of levodopa was specific to depressed patients with higher inflammation, this functional connectivity may be used to assess the responsiveness of the brain to novel treatments that might be targeted to this subtype of depressed patients in future studies and clinical trials,” says Felger.
About this psychopharmacology and depression research news
Author: Jennifer Johnson McEwen
Source: Emory University
Contact: Jennifer Johnson McEwen – Emory University
Image: The image is in the public domain
Original Research: Open access.
“Functional connectivity in reward circuitry and symptoms of anhedonia as therapeutic targets in depression with high inflammation: evidence from a dopamine challenge study” by Mandakh Bekhbat et al. Molecular Psychiatry
Abstract
See also
Functional connectivity in reward circuitry and symptoms of anhedonia as therapeutic targets in depression with high inflammation: evidence from a dopamine challenge study
Increased inflammation in major depressive disorder (MDD) has been associated with low functional connectivity (FC) in corticostriatal reward circuits and symptoms of anhedonia, relationships which may involve the impact of inflammation on synthesis and release of dopamine.
To test this hypothesis while establishing a platform to examine target engagement of potential therapies in patients with increased inflammation, medically stable unmedicated adult MDD outpatients enrolled to have a range of inflammation (as indexed by plasma C-reactive protein [CRP] levels) were studied at two visits involving acute challenge with the dopamine precursor levodopa (L-DOPA; 250 mg) and placebo (double-blind, randomized order ~1-week apart).
The primary outcome of resting-state (rs)FC in a classic ventral striatum to ventromedial prefrontal cortex reward circuit was calculated using a targeted, a priori approach.
Data available both pre- and post-challenge (n = 31/40) established stability of rsFC across visits and determined CRP > 2 mg/L as a cut-point for patients exhibiting positive FC responses (post minus pre) to L-DOPA versus placebo (p < 0.01).
Higher post-L-DOPA FC in patients with CRP > 2 mg/L was confirmed in all patients (n = 40) where rsFC data were available post-challenge (B = 0.15, p = 0.006), and in those with task-based (tb)FC during reward anticipation (B = 0.15, p = 0.013).
While effort-based motivation outside the scanner positively correlated with rsFC independent of treatment or CRP, change in anhedonia scores negatively correlated with rsFC after L-DOPA only in patients with CRP > 2 mg/L (r = -0.56, p = 0.012).
FC in reward circuitry should be further validated in larger samples as a biomarker of target engagement for potential treatments including dopaminergic agents in MDD patients with increased inflammation.
New research indicates signs of depression can be detected in speech patterns
New research published in BMC Psychiatry finds that changes in speech like speed, pitch, number of pauses, and intensity can predict who may report more depressive symptoms. The research team found they could predict with 93% accuracy who would have scores on a measure of depression high enough to be clinically significant. This research may lead to new early screening methods for depression.
Major depressive disorder is one of the most common mental illnesses of our time; it is found everywhere in the world and, according to the WHO, affects more than 264 million people. An illness that affects so many can benefit from early detection methods. Research has found that if early signs of depression are caught, therapeutic interventions may reduce the intensity of the depressive episode. Alexandra König and colleagues recognize that objective and easy-to-use tools for early identification are needed.
It has been known for some time that those who are depressed speak differently; speed, fluency, and pitch are known to change during depressive episodes. Clinicians report that they look for these speech characteristics during the diagnosis process. If this is so, König and the research team were curious if a speech analysis test could be developed to look for speech differences in those at risk for depression.
In order to determine if this was possible, subjects with no clinical diagnosis were used in the hopes that some would have more depressive symptoms and would be identified through speech analysis. One hundred and eighteen university students were recruited for the study. First, participants took an assessment called “Trail Making.” This assessment was intended to measure their cognitive speed at problem-solving. Next, they took an assessment of depressive symptoms; then, they were recorded speaking.
The speech task asked them to speak for one minute about something positive in their life and one minute about something negative. The speech task was analyzed, looking for specific acoustic features, how many words were said, and how many words were said in a speech segment (before a pause).
Their results found that 25 of their subjects scored high enough on the measure of depression to be considered for a clinical diagnosis of depression. These 25 subjects spoke more words than those who did not score high for depression, and this was true in both the positive and negative stories. In addition, speed of speech, pitch, and prosodic features of speech were excellent predictors of who would have depression scores. Finally, those with high depression scores took more time to complete the Trail Making Test.
The research team acknowledges some limitations to their work. Their speech recording was short, just two minutes per subject, which may have needed longer to make reliable predictions. Second, the subjects of their study were all university students, making the sample, not representative. Finally, the subjects were not clinically observed, so it is impossible to know if they would have been diagnosed with clinical depression.
These limitations notwithstanding, the research team finds their work valuable in the pursuit of early detection of depressive symptoms. They conclude, “Taken together, our study adds to the current literature that speech features are sensitive for the detection of depressive symptoms even in a non-clinical sample.”
The study, “Detecting subtle signs of depression with automated speech analysis in a non-clinical sample”, was authored by Alexandra König, Johannes Tröger, Elisa Mallick, Mario Mina, Nicklas Linz, Carole Wagnon, Julia Karbach, Caroline Kuhn, and Jessica Peter.
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ADHD Persists Throughout Life – Strongly Linked to Mental Health Issues Like Anxiety and Depression
New research has shed light on the link between Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and mental health, finding that adults with high levels of ADHD symptoms are more likely to experience anxiety and depression than adults with autism. This is a significant finding, as there has been a lack of research on the effects of ADHD on mental health, and people with ADHD have often struggled to access the clinical care they need to cope with their symptoms.
A new UK study shows adults with high levels of
This study is the first to show that ADHD is more predictive of poor mental health outcomes in adults than other neurodevelopmental conditions, like autism.
Until now, there has been a dearth of information on the effects of ADHD on poor mental health, with far more research focusing on the impact of autism on depression, anxiety, and quality of life. As a result, people with ADHD have often struggled to access the clinical care they need to cope with their symptoms.
The authors of the study hope their findings will trigger new research into ADHD and ultimately improve the mental health outcomes for people with the condition. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by inattention and/or hyperactivity and impulsivity. The condition is estimated to affect between 3% and 9% of the population.
Blue Monday
Speaking on Blue Monday (January 16) – the third Monday of January, described by some as the gloomiest day of the year – lead researcher, Luca Hargitai, said: “Scientists have long known that autism is linked to anxiety and depression, but ADHD has been somewhat neglected.
“Researchers have also struggled to statistically separate the importance of ADHD and autism for mental health outcomes because of how frequently they occur together.”
Ms. Hargitai, a PhD Researcher at Bath, added: “Our aim was to precisely measure how strongly ADHD personality traits were linked to poor mental health while statistically accounting for autistic traits.”
The new research – a collaborative effort between the Universities of Bath, Bristol, and Cardiff, and King’s College London – is published this week in the prestigious journal
“The condition affects many people – both children and adults – and the fact that more people are willing to talk about it is to be welcomed,” said Ms. Hargitai. “The hope is that with greater awareness will come more research in this area and better resources to support individuals in better managing their mental health.”
Overly active, as though driven by a motor
The study used a large, nationally representative sample of adults from the UK population. All participants completed gold standard questionnaires – one on autistic traits, the other on ADHD traits – responding to statements such as “I frequently get strongly absorbed in one thing” and “How often do you feel overly active and compelled to do things, like you were driven by a motor?”
The researchers found that ADHD traits were highly predictive of the severity of anxiety and depression symptoms: the higher the levels of ADHD traits, the more likely a person is to experience severe mental health symptoms. Through innovative analytical techniques, the study authors further confirmed that having more of an ADHD personality was more strongly linked to anxiety and depression than autistic traits.
These results were replicated in computerized simulations with a 100% ‘reproducibility rate’. This showed, with great confidence, that ADHD traits are almost certainly linked to more severe anxiety and depression symptoms in adults than autistic traits.
Shifting the focus of research and clinical practice
Ms. Hargitai said: “Our findings suggest that research and clinical practice must shift some of the focus from autism to ADHD. This may help to identify those most at risk of anxiety and depression so that preventative measures – such as supporting children and adults with the management of their ADHD symptoms – can be put in place earlier to have a greater impact on improving people’s well-being.”
According to Dr. Punit Shah, senior author and associate professor of Psychology at Bath, another important aspect of the new study is that it advances scientific understanding of neurodevelopmental conditions.
“By addressing the shortcomings of previous research, our work provides fresh information about the complex links between neurodiversity and mental health in adults – an area that is often overlooked.
“Further research is now needed to delve deeper into understanding exactly why ADHD is linked to poor mental health, particularly in terms of the mental processes that might drive people with ADHD traits to engage in anxious and depressive thinking.
“At the moment, funding for ADHD research – particularly psychological research – is lacking. This is especially pronounced when you compare it to the relatively high level of funds directed at autism.
“As the evidence becomes clear that ADHD isn’t just a childhood condition but persists throughout life, we must adjust our research agendas to better understand ADHD in adulthood.”
Commenting on the new findings, Dr. Tony Floyd, CEO of ADHD Foundation, The Neurodiversity Foundation, said: “This research demonstrates clear evidence of the increased risks of mental health comorbidities associated with adult ADHD. This is a step towards recognizing the broader impact of unmanaged and untreated ADHD. We hope this research will lead to more research being commissioned in this area. We also hope it will result in changes to the design and delivery of health services.
“The cost implications to the NHS of leaving ADHD untreated, and the need to better train health practitioners in both primary and secondary care, are now more apparent. And of course, there are other costs too that need to be considered – to the health of UK citizens with ADHD and to their family life, employability, and economic well-being. These costs are often hidden but they are considerable.
“This research from Bath University will add to the growing national debate and the business case for a national review of health services for ADHD across a person’s lifespan.”
Reference: “Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder traits are a more important predictor of internalising problems than autistic traits” by Luca D. Hargitai, Lucy A. Livingston, Lucy H. Waldren, Ross Robinson, Christopher Jarrold and Punit Shah, 16 January 2023, Scientific Reports.
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-022-26350-4