Depression promotes chronic diseases

Depression in the youth favor chronic diseases

01/09/2012

According to a US study, the risk of getting a chronic disease as an adult is helped by depression in adolescence. Emotional stress situations in childhood can be the cause of heart disease and diabetes.

Emotional stress causes chronic inflammation
The scientists assume that depression in adolescence increase the susceptibility to stress. The stress can in turn cause chronic inflammation. The study looked at 1420 people aged 9-13 years. By the time they reached the age of 16, they were asked to undergo an annual examination and two more times between the ages of 19 and 21. The study included standardized questionnaires to diagnose depressive symptoms and blood tests to measure an inflammatory marker.

The result of the study showed that the more pronounced the depression in adolescence, the higher inflammatory values ​​occurred later. Until the results of the study were evaluated, it was not clear whether high levels of inflammation were caused by high levels of depression or depression.

Widespread depression
Worrying are the results of the US study, especially because depression has become a common disease. In the meantime, one out of every five Germans has ever had a depression or depressive episode in his life. According to health insurance, more than four million people in Germany suffer from therapy-related depression.

A science team from the State University of New York reported in the science magazine „BMC Medicine“, that especially people in industrialized countries with relatively high incomes are affected by depression. Why just wealthy people suffer from this mental disorder, can only be speculated. The sentence „money alone does not make you happy“ It may be right on the spot. The pursuit of wealth and prosperity is not synonymous with the state of general bliss. Because sufferers often have to spend a significant part of their lives to achieve a higher income. Private, personal luck sometimes falls by the wayside. (Ag)

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Picture: Gerd Altmann