The high prevalence of depression in multiple sclerosis (MS) is well established.
The lifetime prevalence of major depression in MS is 50% compared with an estimated
prevalence of 10–15% in the general population (
1
). Neuroinflammation is one potential mechanism that could be the cause of the increased
rate of depression. MS is an inflammatory autoimmune disorder resulting in chronic
microglial activation and subsequent neurodegeneration (
2
), and evidence suggests that major depression independent of comorbid medical illness
is associated with the presence of peripheral inflammatory markers (
3
). Colasanti et al. (
4
), in Biological Psychiatry, draw on these converging lines of research to address the question of whether the
high prevalence of depression in patients with MS is associated with neuroinflammation
in specific brain regions. The authors select the hippocampus as their region of interest,
considering the following: 1) the hippocampus may be particularly sensitive to neuroinflammation,
2) the hippocampus is functionally connected to the medial prefrontal cortex, amygdala,
and subgenual cingulate responsible for emotional processing, and 3) some but not
all evidence suggests that hippocampal pathology features prominently in both MS and
major depression (
4
). Understanding whether hippocampal neuroinflammation is associated with depression
has clinical implications for MS that would generalize to the study of other neuropsychiatric
illnesses.To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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References
- Depression in multiple sclerosis: A review.J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry. 2005; 76: 469-475
- Multiple sclerosis is an inflammatory T-cell-mediated autoimmune disease.Arch Neurol. 2004; 61: 1613-1615
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- Hippocampal neuroinflammation, functional connectivity, and depressive symptoms in multiple sclerosis.Biol Psychiatry. 2016; 80: 62-72
- Novel MRI and PET markers of neuroinflammation in multiple sclerosis.Curr Opin Neurol. 2016; 29: 229-236
- In vivo assessment of brain white matter inflammation in multiple sclerosis with (18)F-PBR111 PET.J Nucl Med. 2014; 55: 1112-1118
- A randomized controlled trial of the tumor necrosis factor antagonist infliximab for treatment-resistant depression: The role of baseline inflammatory biomarkers.JAMA Psychiatry. 2013; 70: 31-41
- Etanercept and clinical outcomes, fatigue, and depression in psoriasis: Double-blind placebo-controlled randomised phase III trial.Lancet. 2006; 367: 29-35
- The effect of antidepressant medication treatment on serum levels of inflammatory cytokines: A meta-analysis.Neuropsychopharmacology. 2011; 36: 2452-2459
- In vivo radioligand binding to translocator protein correlates with severity of Alzheimer’s disease.Brain. 2013; 136: 2228-2238
Article info
Publication history
Published online: May 06, 2016
Accepted:
May 2,
2016
Received in revised form:
May 2,
2016
Received:
April 29,
2016
Identification
Copyright
© 2016 Society of Biological Psychiatry. Published by Society of Biological Psychiatry All rights reserved.
