Application of near-infrared spectroscopy in the diagnosis and efficacy assessment of depressive disorder / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

ABSTRACT

Depressive disorder is a common mental disorder.At present, the diagnosis of depressive disorder mainly relies on patients' self-reported symptoms and clinical interviews which are relatively subjective.As one of the new technologies assisting diagnosis and therapeutic effect evaluation of depressive disorder, near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) has received a lot of attention in recent years.This article reviewed studies of using NIRS in the diagnosis and therapeutic effect evaluation of depressive disorder in the past five years.The review showed that NIRS could reflect abnormal hemodynamic activities of the prefrontal cortex and temporal cortex of patients with depressive disorder, especially the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and inferior frontal gyrus.Changes of concentration of oxygenated hemoglobin in these areas showed higher accuracy in assisting the diagnosis of depression disorder.Until now, only a few longitudinal studies utilized NIRS to compare changes of cerebral hemodynamic activities at different time points of treatment which preliminarily confirmed the potential of NIRS in the evaluation of therapeutic effects of depressive disorder.In future, more large-scale studies will be needed to further determine the specific application standards for NIRS in the diagnosis and therapeutic effect evaluation of depressive disorder.