Aim: To assess the role of lithium treatment in the relationship between bipolar disorder (BD) and leukocyte telomere length (LTL). Materials & methods: We compared LTL between 131 patients with BD, with or without a history of lithium treatment, and 336 controls. We tested the association between genetically determined LTL and BD in two large genome-wide association datasets. Results: Patients with BD with a history lithium treatment showed longer LTL compared with never-treated patients (p = 0.015), and similar LTL compared with controls. Patients never treated with lithium showed shorter LTL compared with controls (p = 0.029). Mendelian randomization analysis showed no association between BD and genetically determined LTL. Conclusion: Our data support previous findings showing that long-term lithium treatment might protect against telomere shortening.
Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a chronic, severe psychiatric illness with an incidence of 3% worldwide. MDD patients have a significantly impaired quality of life and reduced life expectancy compared to unaffected individuals, the latter being largely accounted for by an increased incidence of suicide and cardiovascular disorders. The premature mortality observed in MDD has been considered a signature of accelerated aging, a hypothesis supported by data showing altered functioning and morphology of several brain regions that are typically present in the aging population.
We report on a boy with a ring 18 chromosome associated with hypothalamic growth hormone (GH) deficiency. A 12-month trial of GH replacement therapy (0.5 U/kg/week) resulted in a marked growth acceleration. Our findings emphasise the need of evaluating GH secretion in patients with abnormalities of the 18 chromosome.
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