الفهرس 
Overview on depressive disorders
Neuro-anatomical abnormality.Only 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Summary
At least 20% of the general population will experience a mood episode at some time in their lives or, even worse, develop a mood disorder. Within mood disorders, bipolar (BD) and major depressive disorder (MDD) are the most frequent and disabling ones.
Bipolar disorder is a chronic recurrent mental disorder characterized by mood shifts, ranging from acute depression to mania and hypomania, and followed by a return to euthymia. The BD affects around 2% of the general population, with a typical early onset before 30 years of age. On the other hand, MDD is characterized by a chronic recurrence of depressive episodes with a lifetime prevalence of about 12%. Patients generally reach clinical attention only years after the illness onset, with a delay of 6– 10 years for a correct diagnosis.
Inflammatory markers could help identify homogeneous sets of patients who will benefit most from a particular treatment. Inflammatory markers could also complement clinical assessment by highlighting changes in the levels of biomarkers that occur in parallel or ahead of changes in clinical symptoms, allowing physicians to make adjustments in therapy quickly.
Several studies showed the increase of inflammatory marker levels such as homocysteine, tumor necrosis alpha (TNF), C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin (IL)-6 in depressed patients.