Desbeaumes Jodoin Véronique, Lespérance Paul, Nguyen Dang K, Fournier-Gosselin Marie-Pierre, Richer Francois
Department of Psychology, UQAM, Canada; Department of Psychiatry, CHUM, Canada.
Department of Psychiatry, CHUM, Canada.
Int J Psychophysiol. 2015 Dec;98(3 Pt 1):455-9. doi: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2015.10.001. Epub 2015 Oct 5.
Chronic vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) is a recognized treatment for refractory epilepsy and depression. The vagus nerve projects to several brainstem autonomic structures. As pupillary measures are an easy and non-invasive method to evaluate autonomic functioning, we used resting diameter and light reflex measures to investigate the influence of VNS on the human central autonomic nervous system.
We studied 21 patients (7 with major depression, 14 with epilepsy) treated with chronic VNS (30s ON, 5 min OFF stimulation trains). Resting pupil size and light reflex measures were compared in consecutive intervals with (ON) and without stimulation (OFF).
Compared to the OFF condition, the ON condition was associated with a significant increase in resting pupil diameter, but did not affect light reflex measures. There was no group difference between the two populations of patients (depression and epilepsy) on any of the pupil measures.
VNS at clinically significant levels increases resting pupil diameter.
慢性迷走神经刺激（VNS）是一种公认的治疗难治性癫痫和抑郁症的方法。迷走神经投射到几个脑干自主神经结构。由于瞳孔测量是评估自主神经功能的一种简单且非侵入性的方法，我们使用静息直径和光反射测量来研究VNS对人类中枢自主神经系统的影响。
我们研究了21例接受慢性VNS治疗的患者（7例患有重度抑郁症，14例患有癫痫）（刺激模式为开启30秒，关闭5分钟）。在有刺激（开启）和无刺激（关闭）的连续时间段内比较静息瞳孔大小和光反射测量结果。
与关闭状态相比，开启状态与静息瞳孔直径显著增加有关，但不影响光反射测量结果。在任何瞳孔测量指标上，两组患者（抑郁症和癫痫）之间均无组间差异。
具有临床意义水平的VNS会增加静息瞳孔直径。
