Cerebral metabolic patterns in untreated postmenopausal women with major depressive disorder

Rasgon, Natalie L.; Kenna, Heather A.; Geist, Cheri; Small, Gary; Silverman, Daniel

doi:10.1016/j.pscychresns.2007.12.006

« Previous Next »Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging
Volume 164, Issue 1 , Pages 77-80, 30 October 2008

Cerebral metabolic patterns in untreated postmenopausal women with major depressive disorder

Natalie L. Rasgon
- Stanford Center for Neuroscience in Women’s Health, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, 401 Quarry Road, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
- Corresponding author. Tel.: +650 724 6689; fax: +650 724 3144.
Heather A. Kenna
- Stanford Center for Neuroscience in Women’s Health, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, 401 Quarry Road, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, United States
Cheri Geist
- Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, United States
Gary Small
- UCLA Center on Aging, Memory & Aging Research Center, Jane & Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience & Human Behavior, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, United States
Daniel Silverman
- Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, United States

Received 23 May 2007; received in revised form 31 October 2007; accepted 18 December 2007.

Abstract

Cerebral metabolic rates were assessed using [¹⁸F]-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography in six naturally postmenopausal women with untreated unipolar depression and 11 matched controls. All subjects were hormone therapy-naive and medication-free. Findings include hypermetabolism in the middle frontal gyrus and Broca regions, and hypometabolism in the pons among depressed compared with non-depressed women.

Keywords: Major depressive disorder, Cerebral metabolism, Estrogen depletion