CONTEXT: A little off our usual remit of RWR, but we think this kind of advancement in mental health warrants putting on our news site. Being able to use a simple blood test in diagnosis will always bring benefits for those people on the edge of what the text-books determine to be “typical” symptoms | Hopefully more definitive screening tests will see the end of patient self-reporting and/or clinical impression of an illness | Could this be the beginning of the application of ‘real science’ (diagnostic biomarkers) in the diagnosis and treatment of mental illnesses?
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1. “A new study has found a novel biological basis for mood disorders, allowing researchers to develop a blood test for depression and bipolar disorder aimed at a precision medicine approach to treatment.”
2. ““Through this work, we wanted to develop blood tests for depression and for bipolar disorder, to distinguish between the 2, and to match people to the right treatments,” said Alexander B. Niculescu, MD, PhD, professor of psychiatry at IU School of Medicine, in a press release.”
3. ““Blood biomarkers are emerging as important tools in disorders where subjective self-report by an individual, or a clinical impression of a health care professional, are not always reliable.”
4. “The researchers developed a blood test for RNA biomarkers that can indicate the severity of a patient’s depression, their risk for developing severe depression in the future, and the risk of future bipolar disorder.”
5. ““The brain cannot be easily biopsied in live individuals, so we’ve worked hard over the years to identify blood biomarkers for neuropsychiatric disorders.”
Source URL: https://www.pharmacytimes.com/view/researchers-develop-blood-test-for-depression-severity-bipolar-disorder