Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Found to Improve Cognition in Patients With Depression

This study enrolled 130 adults 18 and older with unipolar or bipolar depression who had been experiencing a major depressive episode for at least four weeks. The participants were randomized to receive 20 sessions (given on consecutive weekdays over four weeks) of either high-dose tDCS (2.5 mA for 30 minutes) or low-dose tDCS (0.034 mA for 30 minutes). Afterwards, all participants had the option to continue with four weeks of open-label, high-dose tDCS treatment.At baseline, after four weeks, and after eight weeks, the researchers assessed participants ’ mood as well as verbal learning, memory, selective attention, auditory attention, working memory, psychomotor processing speed, visuospatial attention, and verbal fluency.Participants in the high- and low-dose tDCS groups experienced mood improvements over the eight-week period. “The study found across all patients and time, that there were improvements in verbal learning and memory, selective visual attention, auditory attention, and information processing speed in both the low- and high-dose tDCS conditions, which were independent of mood effects,” McClintock and coll eagues wrote.They concluded, “The tDCS associated neurocognitive effects require further investigation and replication, which is clinically important as such investigation could provide information to develop personalized tDCS therapeutic approaches to target specific cognitive functions and improve the utility and efficacy o f this noninvasive neuromo...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: attention bipolar depression cognition & Anxiety memory processing speed Shawn McClintock Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation unipolar depression Source Type: research