Components of depression and 6-year mortality after an acute coronary syndrome.

BACKGROUND

Post-myocardial infarct depression includes both somatic depressive symptoms and nonsomatic cognitive symptoms. Their respective relationships to long-term survival are unclear.

METHODS

Depression was diagnosed by measuring the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) on consecutive patients who presented with acute coronary syndrome in 2005. Six-year mortality data were extracted from the National Health Index. This study investigated whether mortality was related to the somatic or cognitive elements of the BDI-II score, controlling for baseline characteristics including the Global Registry of Acute Coronary Events score. The BDI-II, somatic, and cognitive scores were treated as continuous variables.

RESULTS

Of the 277 patients, 52 died over 6 years. Higher BDI-II score did not predict mortality at 6 years (odds ratio [OR], 1.02; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.98-1.06). In the Cognitive/Affective-Somatic model, somatic depressive symptoms (OR, 1.10; 95% CI, 1.01-1.20) predicted all-cause mortality, but cognitive/affective depressive symptoms (OR, 1.01; 95% CI, 0.96-1.08) did not. This association attenuated after controlling for age and sex (OR, 1.10; 95% CI, 0.99-1.22), and age, sex, and Global Registry of Acute Coronary Events score (OR, 1.09; 95% CI, 0.99-1.21). Results from the Somatic/Affective-Cognitive model did not reach statistical significance. Differences were small and unlikely to be of clinical importance.

CONCLUSIONS

In patients with acute coronary syndrome, those who died had a higher baseline BDI-II score, particularly somatic score, although this did not reach statistical significance.