TMS Media – “The Doctors” December 3 I am excited to share with you that on December 3rd “The Doctors” featured a segment on TMS. Todd Hutton, MD, Medical Director, Southern California TMS Center, was invited to appear with a patient who is doing great 18 months post TMS treatment. I hope you can watch and that this contributes to further awareness …
Anhedonia Treatment with Ketamine
The treatment of anhedonia and bipolar depression can be very difficult. An article published in Translational Psychiatry in October of 2014 highlights the role of glutametergic transmission in anhedonia and points to the potentially unique efficacy of ketamine in treating this stubborn problem. Anhedonia, the lack (an-) of pleasure (-hedonia), is one of the 2 main symptoms of a major …
Genetic Testing for Depression Drugs
Genetic testing for depression drugs is a new approach to selecting medications that may have value, especially in patients with treatment resistant depression. We have been using the Genecept Assay for patients with treatment resistant depression and have found that the results improve our ability to choose effective treatments. Patients who have failed multiple adequate trials of medications are much less likely to …
Ketamine for Depression – Mechanism of Action
Ketamine for Depression: How does it work? We ran across a useful review of the basic science literature in an interview of David Nichols on the Psych Congress Network. http://www.psychcongress.com/video/ketamine-quick-guide-receptors-19116 Although ketamine blocks the NMDA subtype of glutamate receptors (blocks an excitatory neurotransmitter) the net effect seems to be an increase in excitatory neurotransmission. This image from Nature may help …
TMS Outcomes – Long Term Study
TMS outcomes have seemed favorable for patients with treatment resistant major depression, but what are the long term effects of TMS (transcranial magnetic stimulation)? TMS is a non-invasive technique for stimulating brain activity in parts of the brain that seem to be turned off in depression – the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. TMS uses magnets to stimulate the brain and the …
Genetic Testing Guides Treatment for Bipolar or Depression
We have been using a relatively new assay from a company called Genomind (the Genecept test) in some of our patients with bipolar and/or depression. The test involves a saliva sample which is analyzed for ten gene variants that may be useful in guiding treatment. So far we find that in about half of the patients with treatment resistant depression …
Depression Costs US 200 Billion Dollars Per Year
A meta-analysis of more than 60 clinical studies covering almost 60,000 adult patients estimates that the total cost in the United States of the treatment of patients with depression is in the range of $188 billion to $200 billion. Roughly a third of all costs ($64 billion) are related to people with treatment-resistant depression, who represent only a fraction of all cases. The article, “A Review of the Clinical, Economic, …