DEPRESSION Associated With Accelerated Cellular Aging. The Los Angeles Times (11/13, Morin) reports that, according to a study published online Nov. 12 in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, US and Dutch researchers “said they found an association between major depressive disorder, or MDD, and accelerated cellular ageing.” On its website, CBS News (11/13, Castillo) reports that in the study, “people who are or had been severely depressed had shorter telomeres.” After studying blood samples from nearly “1,100 people who were currently diagnosed with major depressive disorder (MDD) or clinical depression, 802 people who had previously been diagnosed with MDD and 510 who never had” MDD, researchers found that “people who currently or previously were depressed had 83 to 84 fewer base pairs of DNA in their telomeres than those who never had depression.” Forbes (11/13, Walton) reports that depression may “cause dysregulation in the body’s stress and immune responses, and is associated with an increase in inflammation, all of which could be linked to telomere shortening.” HealthDay (11/13, Goodman) points out that on an annual basis, “people naturally lose about 14 to 20 base pairs of DNA” in their telomeres. However, in the people in the study who had MDD, “the researchers said the difference represents about four to six years of advanced aging.” Also covering the story BBC News (11/13, Roberts) and the Daily Mail (UK) (11/13, Edwards).
Posted on: Fri, 15 Nov 2013 11:54:38 +0000
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