STUDY:
Tachibana, A., Iga, Ji., Ozaki, T. et al. Behavioral and psychological symptoms and brain volumes in community-dwelling older persons from the Nakayama Study. Sci Rep 14, 26097 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-77477-5

This research paper describes a multicenter randomized controlled trial called The HOME Study, which investigated the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a novel approach to psychiatric care called Proactive Integrated Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry (PICLP) for older medical inpatients. The study compared PICLP to usual care, and although the findings did not show a statistically significant reduction in the time older patients spent in the hospital, there were hints that PICLP could be beneficial in increasing the discharge rate and potentially lowering mortality. Additionally, the study found that PICLP was likely to be cost-saving in the short term, suggesting that the positive experiences reported by patients and staff could be achieved without additional costs to the hospital.

STUDY:
Sharpe M, Walker J, van Niekerk M, Toynbee M, Magill N, Frost C, White IR, Walker S, Duarte A, Owens C, Dickens C. Proactive integrated consultation-liaison psychiatry and time spent in hospital by older medical inpatients in England (The HOME Study): a multicentre, parallel-group, randomised controlled trial. The Lancet Psychiatry. 2024 Sep 1;11(9):684-95.

This research investigates the relationship between changes in white matter microstructure and cognitive decline in individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD). The study follows a large cohort of participants with MDD and healthy controls over a two-year period, analyzing cognitive performance and white matter integrity using neuropsychological tests and diffusion-weighted imaging. The authors found that individuals with MDD showed a greater decline in white matter integrity in the superior longitudinal fasciculus, a brain region important for information processing, compared to healthy controls. Furthermore, the study found a robust association between cognitive decline and the decline in white matter integrity across all participants. While changes in white matter integrity did not mediate the relationship between disease course and cognitive performance, the authors suggest that this could be due to the relatively short follow-up period and the mild disease course in their sample. The study emphasizes the crucial role of white matter microstructure and disease progression in depression-related cognitive dysfunction, highlighting the need for future research to investigate these complex relationships further.

STUDY:
Flinkenflügel K, Meinert S, Hirtsiefer C, Grotegerd D, Gruber M, Goltermann J, Winter NR, Stein F, Brosch K, Leehr EJ, Böhnlein J. Associations between white matter microstructure and cognitive decline in major depressive disorder versus controls in Germany: a prospective case-control cohort study. The Lancet Psychiatry. 2024 Nov 1;11(11):899-909.