Historically, depressive disorders in adolescents have been conceptualised as variants of the non specific class of childhood emotional or neurotic disorder, which encompassed depressive, anxiety, hysterical and obsessional disorders. Over the past decade, however, the field has shifted towards greater diagnostic refinement. Research evidence has shown that severe depressive disorders differ fr...

OBJECTIVE There is evidence of more obesity among persons with depressive and depressive and anxiety disorders. However, the nature and the underlying mechanisms of the association are still unclear. This study examines the association between depressive and anxiety disorders and obesity, physical activity, and social activity, and examines whether social and physical activity are potential inf...

BACKGROUND The rate of comorbid depression and medical illness varies from 10 to 40%. Patients with depressive disorder compared to general population more often have cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disorders, diabetes, irritable bowel syndrome, and some types of tumor. Side effects of mental health medications may appear in a form that is very similar to clinical presentation of somatic ill...

146 cases of schizophrenia, fulfilling Research Diagnostic Criteria and a regular followup of 6 months or more, were studied concerning depressive mood disorders at the onset of illness and over a period of time following neuroleptic treatment. There was no significant difference in the total number of cases depressed at the onset of illness (49) and at final follow up (56). Following 8 weeks o...

OBJECTIVE The associations of vitamin B(12), folate, and homocysteine with depression were examined in a population-based study. METHOD The authors screened 3,884 elderly people for depressive symptoms. Subjects with positive screening results had psychiatric workups. Folate, vitamin B(12), and homocysteine blood levels were compared in 278 persons with depressive symptoms, including 112 with...

BACKGROUND In January 2002 the New York City Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society convened a panel of experts to review the issue of depressive affective disorders associated with multiple sclerosis (MS). This Consensus Conference was supported by a grant from the Goldman family of New York City. RESULTS The panel reviewed summaries of current epidemiologic, neurobiologic, and t...

How and why do clinical depressive disorders emerge in adolescence? In this Personal View, we present a neurodevelopmental theory to address causes for adolescent onsets of clinical depressive disorders. We argue that theories should account for three perplexing aspects of depressive disorders in adolescence: the episodic nature of depression; differences between sexes in rates of depression ac...