Intravenous Glucose Tolerance Test in Depression

Activity of the Hypothalamus-Pituitary-Adrenal System and Oral Glucose Tolerance in Depressed Patients

“…There is evidence from earlier studies that glucose tolerance is impaired in depressed patients [12,13,14]. However, this is the first study to confirm that in depressed patients glucose tolerance is dependent on the level of HPA system activation.…”

“…Especially, patients with major depression exhibit insulin resistance during glucose tolerance tests [12,13,14]. However, these previous studies did not measure HPA activity or were unable to find an association between hypercortisolemia and impaired glucose tolerance.…”

Psychological Characteristics of Patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)

“…Based on these findings and prior ones suggesting a biochemical similarity between patients with ALS and severe psychotic depression (2)(3)(4), the authors concluded that the association of ALS with a characteristic personality style, if confirmed, might have etiologic and prognostic implications.…”

Impact of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor citalopram on insulin sensitivity, leptin and basal cortisol secretion in depressed and non-depressed euglycemic women of reproductive age

“…In fact, the prevalence of depression in the female population has been postulated to be between 5 and 9%, and psychometric studies suggest that the lifetime risk in women may approach 25% [1]. Since major depression in women is an established risk factor for menstrual cycle dysfunction and infertility [2,3], it comes as no surprise that depression has been associated with multiple endocrine and metabolic disturbances, including: (1) Disruption of the hypothalamic-pituitaryadrenal (HPA) axis [4][5][6][7]; (2) Insulin resistance [8][9][10][11][12][13][14]; (3) Impaired diabetic control [1,15]; (4) Thyroid dysfunction [16]; (5) Somatotropin hypersecretion [16]; (6) Sympathetic nervous system activation [17,18]; (7) Central serotonergic hypofunctioning [19]; (8) Lower serum cholesterol concentrations [20]; and (9) Weight gain or loss [21,22].…”