Frequency of hospitalization for severe depression or bipolar disorder may be associated with increased risk for dementia

The frequency of hospitalization for severe clinical depression or bipolar disorder may increase the risk of developing dementia, suggests a study in the December issue of the Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery and Psychiatry.

The current work was done as a case register study in Denmark, where the authors were able to review records for psychiatric hospitalizations between 1970 and 1999. In all, almost 19,000 patients with depression and just over 4,000 with bipolar disorder, all of whom were admitted at least once for their condition, were included in the study.

Analysis of the data showed that a diagnosis of dementia was strongly related to the number of previous hospitalizations for either severe depression or bipolar disorder.

Just under 2 percent (337) of patients with severe depression and just over 2 percent (97) of those with bipolar disorder were diagnosed with dementia on a subsequent re-admission.

On average, the risk of being diagnosed with dementia increased 13 percent with every admission to hospital for severe depression, and by 6 percent with every admission for bipolar disorder. The findings held even after adjusting for factors likely to influence the results, such as age and gender.

The authors suggest that repeated episodes of depression or bipolar disorder may permanently alter brain tissue (the “scar hypothesis”), as has been suggested in previous research.

They concluded that the results point to the importance of early and sustained treatment to prevent worsening of symptoms.


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