Longitudinal associations between depression and functioning in midlife women

Abstract

Associations between depression and impaired functioning are well known and have been documented in numerous clinical, primary care and epidemiological studies. Reviews of this research have focused on the elderly. Recent studies suggest that women become increasingly vulnerable during the menopausal transition to declines in physical and role function and increases in depressive symptoms. The purpose of the current research is to review the literature since 1966 for studies examining the association between depression and physical and psychosocial impairment in midlife women. We selected only longitudinal studies that had the potential to elucidate the nature of the complex relationship between depression and functioning. Results of the review indicate evidence for bi-directional associations between depression and functioning in middle-aged women. However, the studies are only broadly informative. Most adjusted for only a limited group of factors that could be associated with both depression and functioning. None of them directly examined potential moderators or mediators of the relationship between depression and impaired functioning.

Relationships of depressive behavior and sertraline treatment with walking speed and activity in older female nonhuman primates

“…Depressed cynomolgus macaques share many physiological, neurobiological, and behavioral characteristics of human depression, including reduced body mass, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis perturbations, autonomic dysfunction, increased cardiovascular disease risk, reduced hippocampal volume, altered serotonergic function, decreased activity levels, low ovarian steroid levels, and increased mortality (Shively et al 2008(Shively et al , 2017Willard and Shively 2012;Willard et al 2015;Silverstein-Metzler et al 2017;. In this investigation, we also confirm the susceptibility of depressed monkeys to exhibit functional declines and increased sedentariness as observed clinically at mid to late life (Bromberger and di Scalea 2009;Lenze et al 2005;Cronin-Stubbs et al 2000). Second, the study benefited from measurement of multiple conceptually related but independent outcomes related to function, activity, and sedentariness.…”

Depression in the menopause transition: risks in the changing hormone milieu as observed in the general population

“…There is accumulating evidence but no definitive answers about many potential risk factors and the role of the changing hormone milieu associated with depressed mood around menopause. Further information is clinically important, because of the diminished functioning and significant disability that accompany depression [1,2], the exacerbation of disorders associated with the neuroendocrine system [3], and the associations of depression with other major health problems, including cardiovascular disease [4][5][6], metabolic syndrome [7][8][9] and osteoporosis [10,11], that complicate treatments and contribute substantially to disability and the high costs of health care.…”

The Bidirectional Association between Depressive Symptoms and Gait Speed: Evidence from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA)

“…Evidence is accumulating that elevated depressive symptoms are a risk factor for physical disability [1–5] and poor physical performance [6–9] at older ages. Physical disability and physical performance are closely related [10] with decreasing physical performance often viewed as a precursor to physical disability [11,12].…”

“…Despite the parallel development of these two lines of research and suggestions that depression and physical decline and disability might be mutually reinforcing [2,3,5,13,19] research on the bidirectional association between elevated depressive symptoms and physical disability [20–25] or declines in physical performance [23,26] is limited, with some studies providing evidence for a bidirectional longitudinal association [20,22,23] and other studies not [21,24–26]. This research is in addition limited by the use of samples that are selected [20,21] and not representative of the general population [20–26].…”