Memory impairment in patients with late-onset major depression: The effect of antidepressant therapy
Abstract
Background Cognitive deficits have been described in patients with major depression (MD), although many aspects remain unsettled.Method During an episode of MD and after remission we used tasks exploring attention, implicit, anterograde and retrograde memory to investigate 48 drug-free patients aged over 50 years without dementia, comparing them with 15 normal volunteer controls (NC). We also evaluated the effect of antidepressant therapy (ADT) with fluoxetine (F) or reboxetine (R) at baseline (T0) and six months later (T6).Results 42 patients completed the study and 6 dropped out; 33 patients were considered "Remitters" (RP) (17 F pts and 16 R pts). At T0, the entire group of MD patients (MDP) had worse performances than NC in Mini Mental Status Examination (MMSE), Wechsler Memory Scale (WMS) total score (TS), in a few subtests of WMS and in autobiographical memory. RP at T0 had the same impaired tasks and at T6 had significantly improved in MMSE, WMS. TS and many memory tests but they still differed from NC in a few complex tasks requiring more cognitive effort.Limitations The effects and differences between F and R must be viewed with caution considering the relatively small sample; only attention and memory were investigated.Conclusions Our findings confirm a negative effect of depression on memory with a significant but incomplete improvement after remission and without differences between F and R. We speculate that both a "state" and a "trait" depressive component underlie this memory impairment.
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Similar cognitive improvements have been obtained when comparing fluoxetine or reboxetine treatment.
“similar results have been obtained when comparing cognitive performance following treatment with fluoxetine or the selective noradrenergic reuptake inhibitor, reboxetine [15].”
There is also evidence suggesting that changes in cognitive function are associated with symptomatic improvement.
“there is also evidence suggesting that changes in cognitive function are associated with symptomatic improvement [15, 38, 39].”
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“Improved neurocognitive functioning in response to antidepressants with noradrenergic effects has been reported (Gallassi et al., 2006) with neurocognitive gains exceeding those associated with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) treatment in depressed patients (Ferguson et al.”
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- Authors
- Gallassi, R., Di Sarro, R., Morreale, A., & Amore, M.
- Affiliations
- University of Bologna (IT)
- University of Parma (IT)
- Corresponding author
- Gallassi, Roberto
- ORCID
- Amore, Mario
- Venue
- Journal of Affective Disorders
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2006-04
- Volume
- 91
- Issue
- 2-3
- Pages
- 243-250
- ISSN
- 0165-0327 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2065682082
- Cited by
- 118
- References
- 48
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 4 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 2 · 2020: 3 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 9 · 2015: 8 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 3 · 2012: 17
- FWCI
- 5.43
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Affective Disorders (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Archivio istituzionale della ricerca (Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna) (submittedVersion)
- CINECA IRIS Institutial Research Information System (University of Genoa) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Treatment of Major Depression
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Dementia and Cognitive Impairment Research
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
- Keywords
- memory impairment, cognitive deficits in depression, antidepressant treatment, fluoxetine, reboxetine, remission, attention, retrograde memory, autobiographical memory, older adults
- MeSH terms
- Reboxetine, Adolescent, Adult, Depressive Disorder, Major, Major Depressive Disorder, Female, Fluoxetine, Humans, Male, Memory Disorders, Middle Aged, Morpholines, Neuropsychological Tests, Severity of Illness Index, Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, Age of Onset
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