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Several weeks after mild brain ischemia, mice display a depressive-like syndrome characterized by increased anxiety, inactivity and “cheerlessness”. These symptoms of depression following a stroke are associated with the delayed loss of nerve cells in the brain’s reward regions. This is the major finding of a study published in the current issue of Biological Psychiatry.

Scientists at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin collaborating with researchers from Bochum, Magdeburg and Boston were able to show that delayed treatment of laboratory mice with cipramil, an antidepressant of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) family, not only prevented the development of depression, but also attenuated the subacute degeneration of nerve cells in the brain’s reward system after stroke. At the same time, the area in the brain directly affected by the stroke turned out to be smaller in those mice which had received the antidepressant. “These results indicate that antidepressants from the SSRI group protect nerve cells. This effect can also be harnessed even when medication is started days after the stroke,” explains psychiatrist Prof. Golo Kronenberg, who works on the subject of “Depression after Stroke” at the Center for Stroke Research Berlin (CSB) at Charité. [continue reading…]