• Lars Vedel Kessing, Lars Søndergård, Julie Lyng Forman, and Per Kragh Andersen.
• Department of Psychiatry, University Hospital of Copenhagen, Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen Ø, Denmark. lars.kessing@rh.dk
• J Affect Disord. 2009 Sep 1; 117 (1-2): 24-9.

BackgroundIt has been suggested that antidepressants may have neuroprotective abilities but it has newer been investigated lately whether treatment with antidepressants reduces the risk of dementia.MethodLinkage of registers of all prescribed antidepressants and diagnoses of dementia in Denmark during a period from 1995 to 2005.ResultsPersons who purchased antidepressants once (N=687,552) had an increased rate of dementia compared to persons unexposed to antidepressants (N=779,831). Nevertheless, the rate of dementia changed over time; thus during the initial prescription periods the rate increased with the number of prescriptions but continued long-term antidepressants treatment was associated with a reduction in the rate of dementia, however, not to the same level as the rate for the general population. This pattern was found for all classes of antidepressants (SSRIs, newer non-SSRI antidepressants and older antidepressants). All findings were replicated in sub-analyses with Alzheimer's disease as outcome.LimitationsMethodological reasons for the findings cannot be excluded due to the non-randomized nature of data.ConclusionsContinued long-term antidepressant treatment was associated with a reduced rate of dementia, however, not to the same level as the rate for the general population.

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