Citation

Rnic K, LeMoult J, Torres IJ, Chakrabarty T, Foster J, Frey BN, Harkness KL, Ho K, Li QS, Milev R, Quilty LC, Rotzinger S, Soares CN, Uher R, Kennedy SH, Lam RW. Psychiatry Res. 2023; 330: e115606.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2023, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.psychres.2023.115606

PMID

37979318

Abstract

Identifying clinically relevant predictors of depressive recurrence following treatment for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) is critical for relapse prevention. Implicit self-depressed associations (SDAs), defined as implicit cognitive associations between elements of depression (e.g., sad, miserable) and oneself, often persist following depressive episodes and may represent a cognitive biomarker for future recurrences. Thus, we examined whether SDAs, and changes in SDAs over time, prospectively predict depressive recurrence among treatment responders in the CAN-BIND Wellness Monitoring for MDD Study, a prospective cohort study conducted across 5 clinical centres. A total of 96 patients with MDD responding to various treatments were followed an average of 1.01 years. Participants completed the Depression Implicit Association Test (DIAT) - a computer-based measure of SDAs - every 8 weeks on a tablet device. Survival analyses indicated that greater SDAs at baseline and increases in SDAs over time predicted shorter time to MDD recurrence, even after accounting for depressive symptom severity. The findings show that SDAs are a robust prognostic indicator of risk for MDD recurrence, and that the DIAT may be a feasible and low-cost clinical screening tool. SDAs also represent a potential mechanism underlying the course of recurrent depression and are a promising target for relapse prevention interventions.

Language: en

Keywords

Major depressive disorder; Clinical screening tool; Depression Implicit Association Test; Recurrence; Self-depressed associations