Do depressive patients with family history of dementia constitute a separate group? A case report study

INTRODUCTION: Recently it has been suggested that patients with both depression and a family history of dementia are seven times as likely to develop Alzheimer's disease as are controls. METHOD: Fifty patients aged 21 &#45 60 years suffering from DSM-IV Major Depression entered the study; t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of psychiatry in clinical practice 2000, Vol.4 (3), p.215-222
Main Authors: Fountoulakis, Kostas N, Fotiou, Fotis, Iacovides, Apostolos, Kaprinis, George
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Age
Alzheimer's disease
Brain
Case reports
Data processing
Dementia disorders
Depression
Depression Familial Aggregation Psychophysiology Biological Markers Spect Dementia Psychophysiology Dst
Dexamethasone
Electroretinograms
Neurodegenerative diseases
Personality
Single photon emission computed tomography
Visual evoked potentials
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Summary:INTRODUCTION: Recently it has been suggested that patients with both depression and a family history of dementia are seven times as likely to develop Alzheimer's disease as are controls. METHOD: Fifty patients aged 21 &#45 60 years suffering from DSM-IV Major Depression entered the study; three of them (6%) had a positive family history of dementia. Diagnosis was by SCAN v 2.0. The family history method was used to record family history. All depressed patients were investigated with the Dexamethasone Suppression Test (DST), brain SPECT, electro-oculogram (EOG), flash-electroretinogram (f-ERG) and Pattern-Reversal Visual Evoked Potentials (PR-VEPs). Student's t-test was used to analyse the results. All patients with positive family history had atypical features. RESULTS: Two of them suffered from borderline personality disorder, in comparison to eight in the remainder of the sample and five in the rest of the atypicals. The age of onset of depression was lower. DST, SPECT, EOG and PR-VEPs findings were similar between groups. The only significant finding concerned the latency of the bs wave of the scotopic ERG (P < 0.01), but even in this, patients with positive history did not differ from the rest of the atypical patients. CONCLUSION: The present study provided limited data connecting atypical features of depression, personality traits, psychological stressors, hypercortisolaemia and family history of dementia. Further research with larger samples is essential. ( Int J Psych Clin Pract 2000; 4: 215 - 222)
ISSN:1365-1501
1471-1788
1473-4885
DOI:10.1080/13651500050518109