Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology
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Neuropsychopharmacology · Oct 2018
Randomized Controlled TrialEfficacy, tolerability, and cognitive effects of deep transcranial magnetic stimulation for late-life depression: a prospective randomized controlled trial.
Late-life depression (LLD) is a growing worldwide problem due to demographic changes, with limited treatment options due to high rates of pharmacotherapy adverse effects, accessibility of psychotherapy, and tolerability of electroconvulsive therapy. Novel neuromodulation techniques, such as repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), may overcome these limitations. The objective of this study is to determine the efficacy, tolerability, and cognitive effects of high-dose deep rTMS in LLD. ⋯ There was no change on any measure of executive function and no serious adverse events. Adverse effect profiles were similar between active and sham rTMS, except for reports of pain being significantly more common in the active condition (16.0% vs 0%). High-dose deep rTMS appears to be safe, well tolerated, and efficacious in the treatment of LLD.
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Neuropsychopharmacology · Oct 2018
Role of gamma-amino-butyric acid in the dorsal anterior cingulate in age-associated changes in cognition.
GABAergic mechanisms have been shown to contribute to cognitive aging in animal models, but there is currently limited in vivo evidence to support this relationship in humans. It is also unclear whether aging is associated with changes in GABA levels measured with proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS). Spectral-editing MRS at 3 T was used to measure GABA in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) for a large sample of healthy volunteers (N = 229) aged 18-55. ⋯ No association with age or cognitive performance was found in a frontal white matter control region in a subset of participants. The association of GABA with WCST performance was not related to the amount of brain atrophy associated with aging as measured by the proportion of CSF, gray, and white matter in the MRS voxel. These results implicate GABAergic and possibly energetic metabolism in the dACC as mechanisms of age effects in executive function.