Telomeres are aging biomarkers, as they shorten while cells undergo mitosis. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether psychiatric disorders marked by psychological distress lead to alterations to telomere length (TL), corroborating the hypothesis that mental disorders might have a deeper impact on our physiology and aging than it was previously thought. A systematic search of the literature using MeSH descriptors of psychological distress (“Traumatic Stress Disorder” or “Anxiety Disorder” or “depression”) and telomere length (“cellular senescence”, “oxidative stress” and “telomere”) was conducted on PubMed, Cochrane Library and ScienceDirect databases. A total of 56 studies (113,699 patients) measured the TL from individuals diagnosed with anxiety, depression and posttraumatic disorders and compared them with those from healthy subjects. Overall, TL negatively associates with distress-related mental disorders. The possible underlying molecular mechanisms that underly psychiatric diseases to telomere shortening include oxidative stress, inflammation and mitochondrial dysfunction linking. It is still unclear whether psychological distress is either a cause or a consequence of telomere shortening.

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Background: Pain is a common non-motor symptom in Parkinson’s disease (PD), causing impairment in the functionality and quality of life. Objectives: To summarize the effects of deep brain stimulation (DBS) on pain intensity in PD. Design: Systematic review. Methods: A search was conducted using the Pubmed, Scielo, Embase, Lilacs, and Cochrane databases. Keywords were: “Parkinson* AND (“DBS” OR “deep brain stimulation”) AND “pain”. Complete available articles that measured pain intensity before and after DBS were selected. Results: Of the 251 studies, 17 met the criteria. The sample included from 14 to 79 patients (n = 532). The time of surgery was 3 to 96 months. The subthalamic nucleus was the main surgical target. Seventeen and 389 individuals were submitted to unilateral and bilateral implantation, respectively. Globus pallidus was used as a surgical target in three studies. The unilateral implant was performed in 12 patients and the bilateral in 37. Different instruments were used to measure the pain intensity. It declined after surgery in all studies. Conclusion: The results show that pain intensity decreased after DBS, and most studies performed bilateral stimulation in the subthalamic nucleus. This information is important in guiding the therapeutic approach in PD patients with pain. However, the different surgical parameters and instruments used to assess pain limit the summarization of results.