Project Summary

Iheanyi Julian Osuji, Ph.D. (Young Investigator 2005) of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, plans to study the use of neuropsychometric tools as a means to test treatment response in people with major depression compared with imaging studies, which are too expensive. Given the prohibitive costs of providing neuroimaging for all chronically depressed patients as part of their initial assessment, the current study proposes the use of neurocognitive profiles in making predictions about the clinical course of disease. Since there are well-established neuropsychometric tools that tap into frontal and temporal lobe as well as anterior cingulate functions—all shown in imaging to be involved in depression—it stands to reason that a battery of such tests might reliably predict treatment response (e.g., response to psychotherapy vs. pharmacotherapy) in depressed individuals. Thus, it is the hypothesis of the proposed study that neuropsychological profiles will reliably predict the treatment response of chronically depressed patients to a treatment that is a variant of cognitive therapy and/or medication augmentation. If such a signal exists, it will be captured by analysis between and within the groups.

Program Area: MOOD DISORDERS\Unipolar Depression

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