Protocol for teen inflammation glutamate emotion research (TIGER): Toward predictors of treatment response and clinical course in depressed adolescents

Saché M Coury; Vanessa López; Zia Bajwa; Jordan M Garcia; Giana I Teresi; Kate R Kuhlman; Yan Li; Steve Cole; David J Miklowitz; Ioannis Pappas; Tiffany C Ho

doi:10.1016/j.bbih.2023.100718

Protocol for teen inflammation glutamate emotion research (TIGER): Toward predictors of treatment response and clinical course in depressed adolescents

Brain Behav Immun Health. 2023 Dec 20:35:100718. doi: 10.1016/j.bbih.2023.100718. eCollection 2024 Feb.

Authors

Saché M Coury¹, Vanessa López², Zia Bajwa³, Jordan M Garcia⁴, Giana I Teresi⁵, Kate R Kuhlman^{6

7}, Yan Li⁸, Steve Cole^{7

9}, David J Miklowitz¹⁰, Ioannis Pappas¹¹, Tiffany C Ho¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
² Department of Neuroscience, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA.
³ Department of Psychiatry, Columnia University, New York, NY, USA.
⁴ School of Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
⁵ Department of Psychology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, USA.
⁶ Department of Psychological Science, School of Social Ecology, University of California Irvine, Irvine, CA, USA.
⁷ Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology, Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
⁸ Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of California, San Francisco, CA, USA.
⁹ Departments of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences and Medicine, Division of Hematology-Oncology, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
¹⁰ Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
¹¹ Laboratory of NeuroImaging, Stevens Neuroimaging and Informatics Institute, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.

Abstract

Adolescent-onset depression is a prevalent and debilitating condition commonly associated with treatment refractory depression and non-response to first-line antidepressants. There are, however, no objective tests to determine who may or may not respond to antidepressants. As depressed adolescents are especially vulnerable to the lifelong consequences of ineffectively-treated depression, it is critical to identify neurobiological predictors of treatment non-response in this population. Here, we describe the scientific rationale and protocol for the Teen Inflammation Glutamate Emotion Research (TIGER) study, a prospective 18-month investigation of 160 depressed adolescents who will be assessed before and after treatment with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. TIGER will be using ultra-high field imaging to test the effects of acute stress and antidepressant treatment on inflammatory and glutamatergic processes hypothesized to underlie depression maintenance. Results from this work will motivate future studies testing alternative therapeutics for depressed adolescents at risk for treatment resistant depression. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT05329441.

Keywords: Adolescence; Depression; Fronto-cingulate-limbic circuits; Magnetic resonance spectroscopy; Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors; Social stress.

Associated data

ClinicalTrials.gov/NCT05329441

Abstract

Associated data

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