(Press-News.org) INDIANAPOLIS – Stroke patients who are not successfully treated for depression are at higher risk of losing some of their capability to function normally, according to a study in the March 15, 2011 issue of the journal Neurology.
Although as many as a third of those who experience a stroke develop depression, a new study by researchers from the Regenstrief Institute, the schools of health and rehabilitation sciences and of medicine at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis and the Richard L. Roudebush VA Medical Center is the first to look whether managing post-stroke depression improves physical functioning.
They researchers report that individuals who remain depressed three months after a stroke are more likely to have decreased functional capabilities than those whose depression was successfully treated. Functional capabilities include getting dressed, feeding oneself, and accomplishing other tasks. These capabilities increased significantly in those individuals who were treated for depression.
Post-stroke depression appears to be linked to chemical changes in the brain, clinical evidence indicates.
"The relationship between post-stroke depression and recovery of function after a stroke has not been well understood. Previous researchers have looked at both depression and function after stroke but they did not investigate whether identifying and managing depression improved ability to accomplish tasks of daily living and other function related issues," said study first author Arlene A. Schmid, Ph.D., a Regenstrief Institute investigator, an assistant professor of occupational therapy at the IU School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences and a VA Center of Excellence on Implementing Evidence Based Practice investigator.
The researchers in the new study report that successful depression management led to better functionality that might enable the individual to return to work or more thoroughly enjoy leisure functions while decreasing the caregiver burden.
"Restoring lost function after stroke is the number one reason individuals visit occupational therapists," said Dr. Schmid. "Since treating depression helps improve function, occupational therapists should screen for post-stroke depression and, in conjunction with other members of the patient's health care team, help manage depression."
In the Neurology study, whether an individual was depressed or not was determined through use of the Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), a widely used and easy to administer depression screening tool. The PHQ-9 was originally developed by Kurt Kroenke, M.D., a Regenstrief Institute investigator and IU School of Medicine professor of medicine. Dr. Kroenke, who is a co-author of the new study, has described the PhQ-9 as "a sort of a blood pressure cuff for depression."
According to Dr. Schmid, since occupational therapists are trained in mental health issues and see patients frequently, occupational therapists could use the PHQ-9 to screen for depression after stroke and alert a post-stroke patient's physician to the individual's mental status.
In addition to improving functionality, management of depression would lower health care costs associated with functional impairment and other post-stroke treatment issues.
"Post-stroke depression often impacts quality of life after stroke more than even functional impairments. Since it is treatable with common medications, cognitive behavioral therapy and exercise, it is important to recognize it so patients can be treated. This study is one of the first to show not just the link between depression and worse function post-stroke, but that successfully treating depression symptoms actually improves post-stroke outcomes," said Linda S. Williams, M.D., a Regenstrief Institute investigator, associate professor of neurology at the IU School of Medicine, and a VA Center of Excellence on Implementing Evidence Based Practice investigator.
INFORMATION:
Dr. Schmid and Dr. Williams participate in the VA's Stroke Quality Enhancement Research Initiative. Dr. Schmid is VA Career Development Award recipient.
Co-authors of "Post-stroke Depression and Treatment Effects on Functional Outcomes" in addition to Dr. Schmid, Dr. Kroenke and Dr. Williams are Hugh. C. Hendrie, MB, ChB, D.Sc., of the Regenstrief Institute, IU School of Medicine and the IU Center for Aging Research; Tamilyn Bakas, D.N.S., R.N., of the IU School of Nursing and the IU Center for Aging Research; and statistician Jason M. Sutherland, Ph.D., of the University of British Columbia.
The study was funded by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.
Managing post-stroke depression improves physical functioning
2011-03-16
[Attachments] See images for this press release:
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Hannover Messe: Quiet area for sensitive devices
2011-03-16
It is difficult to write a letter on a driving bus, or to measure small distances on a vibrating plate – the vibrations simply interfere too much. Any small vibration coming from the floor is already too much if there is an increased requirement with respect to accuracy. They hamper high-resolution measurements of distance or roughness – as in scanning electron microscopy. They are also not desired in production if precision is a requirement. For this reason, the devices must be settled in such a manner that they are stable and quiet. Damping is necessary also when the ...
Strategies for improved collection of national travel data
2011-03-16
WASHINGTON — Good travel data are essential to measure and monitor the performance of the U.S. transportation system and to help guide policy choices and investments in transportation infrastructure, says a new report from the National Research Council that calls for the creation of a national travel data program. Current data are inadequate to support decision making in the transportation sector.
"Each day our transportation network serves hundreds of millions of travelers and handles millions of tons of freight, yet we are not collecting the data necessary to analyze ...
'Openness prevails' -- have Obama's promises fallen short?
2011-03-16
London, UK (March 15th, 2011) – WikiLeak's disclosures highlight longstanding problems of the overclassification of information and failure of transparency laws, says David L Sobel.
When Barack Obama took office as president in January 2009, he identified transparency as one of the highest priorities on his agenda for change. Writing in the current issue of Index on Censorship, David L Sobel, senior counsel at the Electronic Frontier Foundation in the US, suggests that the president's early promises remain unfulfilled. He argues that, with the US government's failure ...
Wright Law Offices: Bankruptcy in Kingman, Arizona
2011-03-16
Mohave County and its major areas of Kingman, Bullhead City, and Lake Havasu City are especially vulnerable to the poor economic times facing our country. Recently the Kingman Daily Miner reported that the Kingman and Lake Havasu areas had an unemployment rate of 10.2%, this is higher than the Arizona average of 9.4%. The biggest problem with this statistic is that it does not take in to account all the people that have either stopped looking for work or are underemployed.
There is currently an epidemic of of unemployment and underemployment in Kingman, Arizona, as well ...
Collectibles can trigger obsessive-compulsive disorder in vulnerable people
2011-03-16
The massive marketing campaigns launched by publishing houses at the start of the academic year can cause people bound to suffer obsessive-compulsive disorder to develop this pathology before. The fact is that collecting articles without control is a symptom of this serious psychological disorder –one of which most known variants is Diogenes syndrom– and of shopping addiction. These are two mental disorders affecting approximately 12% of the population.
Porcelain dolls, precious stones, world thimbles, watches, fans, dinosaurs, language courses, and tanks and ships in ...
The new adulthood: Extended parental support as a safety net
2011-03-16
Minneapolis, MN —March 15, 2011—A new study from the Journal of Marriage and Family shows that contrary to popular anxieties about slacker young adults who refuse to grow up, or indulgent parents who stifle their adult children's development by continuing to support them, there is evidence that parental assistance in early adulthood promotes progress toward autonomy and self-reliance.
Study author Teresa Swartz, "The fact that young people depend so heavily upon their parents well beyond the age when most people from earlier generations had already started families and ...
New insights into cancer treatment
2011-03-16
Leuven - Jean-Christophe Marine (VIB, K.U.Leuven) strongly argues against the use of Cop1-inhibitory drugs. The protein Cop1 has –for a long time - been seen as an attractive drug target for cancer. But Jean-Christophe Marine found out that Cop1 acts as a tumor suppressor, and thus inhibits tumor formation. His new data will have direct implications for the development of cancer drug targets.
Tumorigenesis: loss of control
Tumors form when control over the cell division is lost; a process that could be compared to losing control over the speed of your car. Two main players ...
Surgical Mistakes More Common Than Patients Believe
2011-03-16
It is every patient's worst nightmare: to wake up in the recovery room after surgery to learn that something went wrong. In some cases, the bad outcome is simply a matter of chance: one of the known risks of the surgery happened to occur. But in other cases, the bad outcome is the direct result of the negligence of the physician performing the surgery and was entirely avoidable.
Surgical mistakes happen much more often than most Americans realize. Sometimes these mistakes are minor and may never cause any harm to the patients, but this is not always the case. According ...
Apnea may be cause for awakening and voiding for those with enlarged prostates report Ben-Gurion U.
2011-03-16
BEER-SHEVA, ISRAEL, March 15, 2011– Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers have shown that a significant number of patients with benign prostate enlargement (BPE) may have Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA), which may be the reason for their night awakenings and urination.
This study compared men between the ages of 55 and 75 who were randomly sampled from primary care clinics, diagnosed with BPE and reported nocturia at least once nightly. The comparison control group had no BPE and one or no nocturia episodes per night.
According to the new study published ...
All wrapped up: K-State researcher's graphene cloak protects bacteria, leading to better images
2011-03-16
MANHATTAN, KAN. -- It's a cloak that surpasses all others: a microscopic carbon cloak made of graphene that could change the way bacteria and other cells are imaged.
Vikas Berry, assistant professor of chemical engineering at Kansas State University, and his research team are wrapping bacteria with graphene to address current challenges with imaging bacteria under electron microscopes. Berry's method creates a carbon cloak that protects the bacteria, allowing them to be imaged at their natural size and increasing the image's resolution.
Graphene is a form of carbon ...