The characteristics of sympathetic skin response in patients with depression / 中华物理医学与康复杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the features of variation of sympathetic skin response(SSR)in depression patients and to clarify the correlation between SSR and the effect of antidepressant therapy in first episode depression.Methods The sample comprised 50 first visit patients,who fulfilled the ICD-10 criteria in a structured interview for depressive disorder.These 50 patients received antidepressant therapy for 6 weeks.Clinical response was defined as ≥50%reduction in total 17-item Hamilton depression rating scale(HAMD).Remission was defined as HAMD score ≤7 at week 6.SSR waveforms were classified into three patterns based on the amplitudes of positive and negative componentsP pattern,N pattern and M pattern.Another 50 healthy subjects were involved in this study as controls.Results (1)SSR could be obtained in all normal subjects but couldn't be recorded in 5 of 50 patients whose HAMD scores>28.SSR waveforul patterns were analyzed in these 45 patients P pattern in 7 cases,N pattern 21,M pattern 17.(2)Depression patients had longer latency and lower amplitude than the controls(P<0.01).P pattern had shorter latency and higher amplitude than N pattern.There were no difference in age,course and HAMD scores among the patients with 3 different SSR patterns.(3)Nine of 21 patients of N pattern treated with fluoxetine were remitters.6 patients were clinical responders.These 15 patients had shorter latency and higher amplitude after treatment than that at the initial stage,but there were still differences in latency and amplitude compared with the controls.Conclusion There were significant damages on sympathetic function of depression patients.N pattern was the most SSR pattern among 45 patients recorded SSR.P pattern had shorter latency and higher amplitude than N pattern.SSR is a sensitive and feasible measure inder for neurocardiac electrophysiologic autonomic regulation examination,which could be used to measure clinical therapeutic efficacy for antideppressant in depression patients.