Melancholia: Does This Ancient Concept Have Contemporary Utility?
Date
2020
Type:
Article
item.page.extent
item.page.accessRights
item.contributor.advisor
ORCID:
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
item.page.isbn
item.page.issn
item.page.issne
item.page.doiurl
item.page.other
item.page.references
Abstract
Many efforts have been made to develop coherent and clinically useful categories of depressive illness, especially to facilitate prediction of morbidity and guide treatment-response. They include proposals to resurrect the ancient concept of melancholia, a form of severe depression with particular symptomatic and proposed psychobiological characteristics. However, modern research is inconsistent in supporting differences between melancholic and nonmelancholic depression. In our recent study of over 3200 patient-subjects with DSM-5 major depressive episodes with/without melancholic characteristics, and matched for illness severity, prevalence of melancholic features was 35.2% with remarkably few clinical differences between melancholic and nonmelancholic subjects. Also, our systematic review of trials comparing melancholic and nonmelancholic subjects found little difference in responses to antidepressant treatments. These findings indicate that the concept of melancholia may have limited value for clinical prediction and treatment-selection. Overlap of symptoms in melancholic and nonmelancholic depression, based on DSM criteria, may limit distinction of melancholia; alternative definitions can be sought, and psychomotor retardation is a particularly strong differentiating feature. For now, however, melancholia seems best considered a state-dependent depression-type strongly associated with greater symptomatic severity, rather than a distinct syndrome. Its current status as a depression-type specifier seems appropriate, and it is a logical target for genetic and other biomedical studies.
Description
item.page.coverage.spatial
item.page.sponsorship
Citation
International Review of Psychiatry, 2020
Keywords
Bipolar disorder, DSM-5, Major depression, Melancholia, Treatment