Depression May Increase Risk of Death Following Heart Procedure, Study Suggests

Older patients with depression may be at greater risk of death following a procedure to replace a damaged aortic valve of the heart, reports astudy published today inJAMA Cardiology.“The clinical implications of our findings support active screening for depression before and after aortic valve procedures to identify patients who may benefit from further psychiatric evaluation for the diagnosis and treatment of a depressive disorder,” wrote Jonathan Afilalo, M.D., M.Sc., of Jewish General Hospital, Montreal, and colleagues.The study included patients who were at least 70 years of age with symptomatic aortic stenosis and who had undergone transcatheter or surgical aortic valve replacement. As part of a larger prospective cohort study, these patients completed a preprocedural assessment of frailty, disability, comorbidity, cognitive function, and mood. Depressive symptoms were assessed using the five-item Geriatric Depression Scale Short Form (GDS-SF) at baseline and follow-up at six and 12 months. The authors defined a GDS-SF score of at least 2 of 5 as indicative of clinically relevant depression.Of the 1,035 patients (427 men and 608 women; mean age of 81.4 years) included in the analysis, 326 patients (31.5%) screened positive for depression. Compared with patients without depression, those with depression were more likely to have diabetes, chronic kidney disease, hypertension, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and/or cerebrovascular disease. Patients with depressio...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: aortic stenosis aortic valve replacement cerebrovascular disease COPD depression diabetes Geriatric Depression Scale Short Form hypertension Jonathan Afilalo kidney disease Source Type: research