A New Approach to Treating Depression
Fri, July 15, 2011 at 02:00AM A presentation at the International Congress of the Royal College of Psychiatrists meeting at Brighton, UK, has drawn considerable attention. The concept, which is a new approach, involves the use of anti-inflammatory drugs alongside antidepressant medication.
Clinically, a link between long-term illnesses and depression has been recognized for years. More recently, the availability of markers of inflammatory processes in the body (cytokines such as C-reactive protein [CRP] and tumor necrosis factor-α [TNF-α]) has allowed the relevance of inflammation to be studied more widely. The possible link between depression and inflammation has been strengthened by the observation that levels of clinical depression increase significantly if the patient is given medication for hepatitis C or a vaccination against typhoid, both known to raise levels of inflammation.
A 2006 Belgian study reported in the journal International Clinical Psychopharmacology showed that the addition of aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) to an antidepressant (a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, or SSRI) improved the response rate and extended the time to remission in treatment-resistant depressed patients.
One researcher at the meeting said they plan a study using the antibiotic minocycline in combination with an antidepressant because it is cheap and well-tolerated. While minocycline is an antibiotic, it also has specific anti-inflammatory properties. This study should serve to test the theory that depression has an inflammatory component. If this can be confirmed, there’s always the possibility that psychotropic drugs could be developed that have a central anti-inflammatory action; they would represent a new generation of antidepressants. I’m sure pharmaceutical research company representatives were listening to these presentations . . .
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