PSY 3391 Lecture Notes - Lecture 26: Prolactin, Cortisol, Menopause

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSY 3391
• Professor: Nafissa Ismail

Document Summary

It was recognized over a century ago that depressed people tend to have low thyroid function. Symptoms of depression can be reduced by trh treatment. Variable tsh response to trh could be present in a subgroup of women who su er depression as part of their pms symptoms. The results of correlative studies linking gh and prolactin to depression are somewhat contradictory. There seems to be nonetheless a fundamental di erence in endocrine function between depressed patients and non-depressed individuals. The negative feedback features of the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (hpa) axis appear to be impaired in depressed patients. Excessive cortisol production has been reported in nearly 50% of depressed patients examined. Elevated cortisol inhibits neuronal activity in the brain. Depressed women display signi cantly reduced estradiol levels compared with non- depressed women. Administration of estrogen in physiological doses improves mood in normal but not in clinically depressed women.