title: Clinical correlates of response to DST. The Dexamethasone Suppression test in depression: a World Health Organisation collaborative study.
abstract: From 9 centres 293 patients took part in the WHO-collaborative study on Dexamethasone-Suppression-Test (DST) in depression to examine the relationship of psychopathological and psychiatric history information to cortisol-levels and suppression/non-suppression status. Differences between the centres were large and significant on nearly all of the measures. The predictor analyses generally suffered from numerically weak correlations with many variables correlating to sex and age. Therefore analyses of the data were adjusted for centre-, sex-, and age-influences. The best predicting features of cortisol were 'fitful, restless sleep', 'change of bodyweight' and 'affective disorders in blood relatives'. The last 2 items together with 'hypersomnia' and 'ideas of insufficiency' were the best predictors of suppression/nonsuppression status. However, statistical evidence did not seem to be strong enough to describe a typical symptom profile of a depressive cortisol suppressor or nonsuppressor.
authors.affiliation: Klinik für Allgemeine Psychiatrie, Essen, FRG.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gastpar
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Gilsdorf
authors.forename: M T
authors.initials: MT
authors.lastname: Abou-Saleh
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Ngo-Khac
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D003866:Depressive Disorder / Q000097:blood / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D003907:Dexamethasone; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006854:Hydrocortisone / Q000097:blood*; D008297:Male; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012621:Seasons; D012737:Sex Factors; D014944:World Health Organization
chemical_list: D003907:Dexamethasone; D006854:Hydrocortisone