Immunity and depression: Insomnia, Retardation, and reduction of natural killer cell activity
Open accessAbstract
Depressed patients show a reduction of natural killer (NK) cell activity which may be associated with specific depressive symptoms. The present study demonstrated that sleep disturbance and retardation, but not other depressive symptoms, were negatively correlated with NK activity in 38 depressed patients. Specific behavioral changes in depression such as sleep disturbance and retardation were found to predict 16% of the variance of cytotoxicity levels in depression.
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Alterations in markers of immune system functioning are most pronounced for individuals with melancholic forms of depression, suggesting inflammation-related processes may be particularly responsible for somatic and physical symptoms.
“alterations in these markers of immune system functioning are most pronounced for individuals with melancholic forms of depression, suggesting that inflammation-related processes may be particularly responsible for somatic and physical symptoms of depression”
From From stress to inflammation and major depressive disorder: A social signal transduction theory of depression. (2014) · cites this paper as Cover & Irwin, 1994
A similar association between short sleep duration and shorter leukocyte telomere length was found in older, but not middle-aged, adults (n = 154) and in children (n = 1,567).
“A similar association was found in older, but not middle-aged, adults (n = 154) (125) and was recently also reported in children (n = 1,567)”
From The Sleep-Immune Crosstalk in Health and Disease (2019) · cites this paper as [125]
Among older (but not middle-aged) adults from a healthy, small-scale (<200 individuals) community sample, good sleep quality (PSQI) appeared to have a protective effect on age-related shortening of PBMC telomere length.
“Among older (but not middle-aged) adults from a healthy, small-scale (<200 individuals) community sample, good sleep quality (assessed by the PSQI) appeared to have a protective effect on age-related shortening of PBMC telomere length”
From The Sleep-Immune Crosstalk in Health and Disease (2019) · cites this paper as [125]
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- Authors
- Cover, H., & Irwin, M.
- Affiliations
- University of California San Diego (US)
- ORCID
- Irwin, Michael
- Venue
- Journal of Behavioral Medicine
- Published
- 1994-04
- Volume
- 17
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 217-223
- ISSN
- 0160-7715 (ISSN-L)
- 1573-3521
- OpenAlex
- W2023021283
- Cited by
- 97
- References
- 21
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 2 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 4 · 2019: 3 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 3 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 3 · 2014: 3 · 2013: 2 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 1.22
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Journal of Behavioral Medicine (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (5r29mh044275-05, 1r01mh046867-01a2)
- National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH46867-01A2, NIMH MH-30914, NIMH 44275-04)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Behavioral Neuroscience › Stress Responses and Cortisol
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Biological Psychiatry › Tryptophan and brain disorders
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Treatment of Major Depression
- Keywords
- depression, natural killer cells, NK cell cytotoxicity, sleep disorders, insomnia, retardation, immune function, depressive symptoms
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Aged, Arousal, Cytotoxicity, Immunologic, Depressive Disorder, Humans, Immune Tolerance, Sleep Initiation and Maintenance Disorders, Killer Cells, Natural, Male, Middle Aged, Personality Inventory, Psychoneuroimmunology
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