Abstract
Abstract. Hippocampus volume has been frequently, but not universally reported to be reduced in people with major depression relative to age-matched healthy controls. Among the potential reasons for this discrepancy in finding across studies is the effect of antidepressant medication. Hippocampus volume was determined by MRI (1.5 Tesla) for 10 people diagnosed with major depression for who detailed history of depression and antidepressant treatment history were known, and 10 age-matched healthy controls with no history of depression. Left, but not right, hippocampus volumes were significantly smaller in the patient group compared to the controls. Furthermore, there was a significant correlation such that left hippocampus volume was smaller with increasing lifetime duration of depression. However, this relationship was moderated by a significant correlation such that greater lifetime duration of antidepressant medication was associated with larger left hippocampus volume. The findings support the contention that antidepressant medication may act to normalize hippocampus volume.
References
2002). Adverse childhood experiences, alcoholic parents, and later risk of alcoholism and depression. Psychiatric Services, 53, 1001–1009.
(2004). Delayed effects of early stress on hippocampal development. Neuropsychopharmacology, 29, 1988–1993.
(2004). Anatomical MRI study of hippocampus and amygdala in patients with current and remitted major depression. Psychiatry Research, 15, 141–147.
(2004). Lower hippocampal volume in patients suffering from depression: A meta-analysis. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 161, 598–607.
(2004). The role of the hippocampus in the pathophysiology of major depression. Journal of Psychiatry & Neuroscience, 29, 417–426.
(1995). Characteristics and significance of untreated major depressive disorder. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 152, 1124–1129.
(1991). Factors affecting service utilization for depression in a white collar population. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 26, 230–237.
(2004). Neuroplasticity in mood disorders. Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, 6, 199–216.
(1998). Neurogenesis in the adult human hippocampus. Nature Medicine, 4, 1313–1317.
(2002). Hippocampal changes in patients with a first episode of major depression. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 159, 1112–1118.
(2006). Reduced hippocampal volume correlates with executive dysfunctioning in major depression. Journal of Psychiatry & Neuroscience, 31, 316–323.
(2001). A voxel-based morphometric study of ageing in 465 normal adult human brains. Neuroimage, 14, 21–36.
(2008). Hippocampal volumes and depression subtypes. Psychiatry Research, 163, 126–132.
(2002). The neuropathology of primary mood disorder. Brain, 125, 1428–1449.
(2004). Hippocampal changes and white-matter lesions in early-onset depression. Biological Psychiatry, 56, 825–831.
(2004). Is major depression a neurologic disorder with psychiatric symptoms? Epilepsy & Behavior, 5, 636–644.
(2005). Hippocampal volume as a predictor of short-term ECT outcomes in older patients with depression. The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 10, 910–913.
(2003). Course of illness, hippocampal function, and hippocampal volume in major depression. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA, 100, 1387–1392.
(2000). Effects of adverse experiences for brain structure and function. Biological Psychiatry, 48, 721–731.
(2007). Lifelong hippocampal neurogenesis: Environmental, pharmacological and neurochemical modulations. Neurochemical Research, 32, 1762–1771.
(2001). Age and gender predict volume decline in the anterior and posterior hippocampus in early adulthood. Journal of Neuroscience, 21, 194–200.
(2001). Hippocampal morphometry in depressed patients and control subjects: Relations to anxiety symptoms. Biological Psychiatry, 50, 960–964.
(2007). Adult hippocampal neurogenesis in depression. Nature Neuroscience, 10, 1110–1115.
(2001). Depression, antidepressants, and the shrinking hippocampus. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98, 12320–12322.
(2006). Reduced hippocampal volume in drug-free depressed patients. Surgical and Radiologic Anatomy, 28, 82–87.
(2001). The amygdala is enlarged in children but not adolescents with autism; the hippocampus is enlarged at all ages. Journal of Neuroscience, 24, 6392–6401.
(2003). Untreated depression and hippocampal volume loss. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 160, 1516–1518.
(1999). Depression duration but not age predicts hippocampal volume loss in medically healthy women with recurrent major depression. The Journal of Neuroscience, 19, 5034–5043.
(1996). Hippocampal atrophy in recurrent major depression. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA, 93, 3908–3913.
(2004). Cellular changes in the postmortem hippocampus in major depression. Biological Psychiatry, 56, 640–650.
(1988). Co-planar stereotaxic atlas of the human brain, New York: Thieme.
(2000). Hippocampal volume in primary unipolar major depression: A magnetic resonance imaging study. Biological Psychiatry, 47, 1087–1090.
(2004). Hippocampal volume and depression: A meta-analysis of MRI studies. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 161, 1957–1967.
(2002). Childhood trauma associated with smaller hippocampal volume in women with major depression. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 159, 2072–2080.
(2004). Localized volume reduction in prefrontal, temporolimbic, and paralimbic regions in schizophrenia: An MRI parcellation study. Psychiatry Research, 131, 195–207.
(2003). Voxel-based analysis of MRI reveals anterior cingulate gray-matter volume reduction in posttraumatic stress disorder due to terrorism. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 100, 9039–9043.
(2008). Mechanisms and functional implications of adult neurogenesis. Cell, 132, 645–660.
(