Department of Psychiatry, West China Hospital of Sichuan University, No. 28 Dianxin South Street, Chengdu, 610041, Sichuan, China.
Frontier Science Center for Disease-Related Molecular Networks, Chengdu, 610041, Sichuan, China.
BMC Psychiatry. 2022 Aug 19;22(1):561. doi: 10.1186/s12888-022-04196-4.
We aimed to investigate the effect of differentially methylated genes and chronic childhood stress on the development of depressive symptoms in Chinese adolescents, as well as to test whether methylation at baseline can be used as a predictor of remission at follow-up after six weeks of treatment.
After recruiting 87 MDD patients and 53 healthy controls, we compared demographic and baseline clinical characteristics. The Childhood Chronic Stress Questionnaire was used to assess stress caused by early-life events. MDD patients underwent six weeks of treatment, and response to treatment was assessed using the Beck Depression Inventory-II. In addition, four MDD patients and five controls were randomly chosen for genome-wide methylation analysis.
The gene RPS6KA5 showed significant methylation differences between the two groups. Severity of chronic childhood stress was significantly associated with increased risk of depression in adolescents, but not with treatment response. Baseline RPS6KA5 methylation can predict remission after six weeks of treatment. We did not observe any interaction between RPS6KA5 methylation and chronic childhood stress.
Our results suggest that RPS6KA5 methylation can be used as a predictor of response to treatment in adolescent MDD patients. Here we offer new evidence for the role of epigenetics in early response to treatment of depression.
ChiCTR, ChiCTR2000033402, 31/05/2020, http://www.chictr.org.cn/index.aspx.
本研究旨在探讨差异甲基化基因和慢性童年期应激对中国青少年抑郁症状发展的影响,并检验基线甲基化是否可以作为治疗后 6 周随访缓解的预测指标。
招募了 87 名 MDD 患者和 53 名健康对照者,比较了人口统计学和基线临床特征。采用儿童期慢性应激问卷评估早期生活事件引起的应激。MDD 患者接受 6 周的治疗,采用贝克抑郁量表-Ⅱ评估治疗反应。此外,随机选择了 4 名 MDD 患者和 5 名对照者进行全基因组甲基化分析。
两组间 RPS6KA5 基因的甲基化存在显著差异。慢性童年期应激的严重程度与青少年抑郁风险的增加显著相关,但与治疗反应无关。基线 RPS6KA5 甲基化可预测治疗 6 周后的缓解。我们未观察到 RPS6KA5 甲基化与慢性童年期应激之间存在任何交互作用。
我们的研究结果表明,RPS6KA5 甲基化可作为青少年 MDD 患者治疗反应的预测指标。本研究为抑郁治疗早期反应的表观遗传学作用提供了新证据。
ChiCTR,ChiCTR2000033402,2020 年 5 月 31 日,http://www.chictr.org.cn/index.aspx。