title: Plasma Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor in treatment-resistant depressed patients receiving electroconvulsive therapy.
abstract: There is an increasing evidence that the Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) could be involved in the mode of action of antidepressants and, perhaps, of ECT. This study aimed to investigate whether the clinical course of medication-resistant depressed patients following a course of ECT might be associated with changes of plasma BDNF concentrations. Our findings showed that at T0 (baseline) plasma BDNF levels of patients were significantly lower than those of control subjects, and that at T2 (after ECT) were significantly increased in parallel with the decrease of the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HRSD) total score. However, only remitter patients who showed higher baseline BDNF levels than non-remitters reached normalized BDNF levels after ECT. These findings would suggest the potential usefulness of baseline plasma BDNF levels as predictors of response to ECT in treatment-resistant depressed patients.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Psichiatria, Neurobiologia, Farmacologia e Biotecnologie, University of Pisa, Via Roma 67, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Armando
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Piccinni
authors.forename: Alessandro
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Del Debbio
authors.forename: Pierpaolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Medda
authors.forename: Carolina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bianchi
authors.forename: Isabella
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Roncaglia
authors.forename: Antonello
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Veltri
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zanello
authors.forename: Enrico
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Massimetti
authors.forename: Nicola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Origlia
authors.forename: Luciano
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Domenici
authors.forename: Donatella
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Marazziti
authors.forename: Liliana
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Dell'Osso
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D019208:Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor / Q000097:blood*; D003865:Major Depressive Disorder / Q000097:blood* / Q000628:therapy*; D004565:Electroconvulsive Therapy; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D016896:Treatment Outcome
chemical_list: D019208:Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor