In new research published in Nature Medicine, researchers from Stanford University School of Medicine argue “one size fits all” may not work
There are six different kinds of depression with different presentations and different neurobiological dysfunctions that treatment needs to be cognisant of and account for, researchers from the Stanford University School of Medicine have argued in a new paper.
The paper published in the journal Nature Medicine used personalized and interpretable scores of brain circuit dysfunction to reach this categorisation. “To enable more precise diagnosis and selection of the best treatment for each individual, we need to dissect the heterogeneity of depression and anxiety. The dominant ‘one-size-fits-all’ diagnostic approach in psychiatry leads to cycling through treatment options by trial and error, which is lengthy, expensive and frustrating, with 30–40% of patients not achieving remission after trying one treatment,” the researchers wrote.
Depression remains one of the lesser understood physiological phenomenon with multiple level resistance in recognising, seeking help and treating it. For India there is an additional layer of complication in the lack of trained mental health personnel that can provide the required level of care.
“Although our identification of six biotypes is one of many possible solutions to disentangling heterogeneity, these biotypes indicate that there may be multiple neural pathways that result in the clinical manifestation of depression and anxiety. By combining imaging data with clinical symptoms and behavior, we delineated clinical patterns that are consistent with the putative function of the circuits underlying each biotype,” the researchers wrote.
