How biomarkers will change psychiatry. Part II: Biomarker selection and potential inflammatory markers of depression.

Part I of this series defined biomarkers and discussed their current use in general medicine and their potential research and clinical utility in psychiatry. In this second column in the series, the authors first discuss the rationale for selecting a biomarker. The second half of the column discusses the potential use of inflammatory biomarkers in depression, with a specific focus on derivatives of the inflammatory biomarker, thromboxane, to illustrate how biomarkers can be developed for use in clinical practice. In the future, biomarkers are likely to become an integral component of psychiatric treatment, providing information about a patient's odds of developing an illness, the severity of illness, and level of response to therapeutic interventions.