Reduced left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex activation during verbal fluency tasks is associated with suicidal ideation severity in medication-naïve young adults with major depressive disorder: A functional near-infrared spectroscopy study

Clinical Applications of Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy in Children and Adolescents with Psychiatric Disorders

“…Previous MRI studies [ 49 - 51 ] reported reduced left prefrontal activation in many areas of the PFC in patients with major depressive disorder. In a study by Lee et al [ 52 ] on the use of fNIRS, reduced hemodynamic changes were observed in the left PFC in the major depressive disorder group than in the healthy control group. This study confirmed that the oxy-hemoglobin changes in the left ventrolateral PFC mediated the indirect effect of depression severity on the severity of suicidal ideation [ 52 ].…”

“…In a study by Lee et al [ 52 ] on the use of fNIRS, reduced hemodynamic changes were observed in the left PFC in the major depressive disorder group than in the healthy control group. This study confirmed that the oxy-hemoglobin changes in the left ventrolateral PFC mediated the indirect effect of depression severity on the severity of suicidal ideation [ 52 ]. Thus, the possibility of fNIRS as a useful auxiliary tool was confirmed even when evaluating suicidal ideation.…”

“Hard to Say, Hard to Understand, Hard to Live”: Possible Associations between Neurologic Language Impairments and Suicide Risk

“…There were some systematic studies which have been repoted [ 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 ] ( Table 2 ), but they approached this topic from a different point of view. Rather than investigating neurological language impairment and its implications as possible SI/SB triggers, they aimed to identify possible deficits in language-related functions, mostly related to verbal fluency, as a part of a broader and more comprehensive profile of executive functions in suicidal vs non-suicidal patients [ 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 ]. In a cross-sectional, case–control study involving inpatients with various clinical diagnoses who had made an SA, Bartfai and colleagues [ 10 ] found that patients who had made SA scored significantly lower in verbal fluency when compared to healthy controls.…”

“…There were some systematic studies which have been repoted [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21] (Table 2), but they approached this topic from a different point of view. Rather than investigating neurological language impairment and its implications as possible SI/SB triggers, they aimed to identify possible deficits in language-related functions, mostly related to verbal fluency, as a part of a broader and more comprehensive profile of executive functions in suicidal vs non-suicidal patients [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21].…”

“…Examining links between verbal fluency and SI/SB, a populationbased prospective cohort study involving nearly 5000 older individuals found that poor verbal fluency significantly increased the risk of SI/SB [19]. Near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) on suicidal patients while they were being administered verbal fluency tasks has been performed; some studies hypothesized that certain anomalies in the prefrontal cortex might constitute potential biomarkers to identify those patient sub-groups with an increased suicide risk [20,21]. The authors suggested that SB risk was increased in semantic dementia patients, even if depression is absent, and closely related to language impairments and stereotypic behavior characterizingthe semantic dementia.…”