Association between Poststroke Depression and Psychological Crisis: A Retrospective Cross-Sectional Study.

OBJECTIVE

To investigate the association between poststroke depression (PSD) and psychological crisis in patients who have experienced a stroke within 6 months.

METHODS

This was a retrospective cross-sectional study that enrolled patients within 6 months after stroke onset. The investigators reviewed medical charts to obtain patients' baseline characteristics, and a psychologist evaluated each patient for depression using the Taiwanese Depression Questionnaire (TDQ) and for psychological crisis using the Triage Assessment System (TAS). A generalized linear model (GLM) was used to analyze the association between the results of the TDQ and TAS.

RESULTS

Ninety-seven patients with stroke were included. Age ( = 0.003), time since onset of stroke ( = 0.041), diabetes mellitus ( = 0.004), hypertension ( = 0.016), heart disease ( = 0.005), and TDQ score were significantly different between the hemorrhagic stroke group and the ischemic stroke group. The TDQ score was significantly lower in the hemorrhagic stroke group ( = 0.012). The TDQ score was associated with the TAS total score and each domain score, and the presence of heart disease was associated with poorer TAS score in the behavioral domain ( = 0.016).

CONCLUSION

PSD is likely an important component of psychological crisis in stroke patients. For clinicians, a comprehensive psychologic evaluation is necessary to optimize treatment.