Changes In Heart Rate Variability In Depressed Patient.

Abstracts: Background: Major depressive disorder is most common mood disorder and is one of the most burdensome and disabling disease in the world. Abnormalities in the hypothalamic-pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis in depressed patients play a substantial role in autonomic dysregulation, as patient with depression have elevated levels of cortisol. The present study was conducted with a motive to compare and evaluate the effects of depression on cardiovascular autonomic functioning compared with healthy controls. Methodology: In this study 72 subjects were selected out of that 36 were depressed and 36 were control. All depressed patient were taken from outpatient department of Psychiatry. All subjects were between the age group of 18- 60 years. Control group were students and employees of Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) having no current or past psychiatric illness. HRV test was done in a well-lighted and ventilated room of Physiology Department. 5 minute ECG recording with 16 channel digital polywrite were taken at resting state. ECG was analysed on Kubios HRV analysis software version 1.1, for calculation of frequency domain parameter. Results: On analysis it was revealed that depressed patients showed altered values of HF component of HRV (23.33 +34.454) than control group (118.31 + 201.186), which is significantly lower (p< 0.05) indicating lower parasympathetic activity. Conclusion: The findings from this study are consistent with the hypothesis that cardiac autonomic dysfunction is experienced by individuals with depression, especially decreased parasympathetic nerve.