Can fMRI scans done prior to antidepressant therapy be beneficial?

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the University of Michigan conducted a study with data suggesting that a functional MRI brain scan may be beneficial for patients being considered for antidepressant therapy.

The group of researchers scanned 36 patients with major depressive disorder using fMRI while looking at the error detection network and the interference-processing network.

The results showed that patients who had more activity within the two brain networks after they made a mistake while performing a cognitive task that was assigned were less likely to be affected by antidepressant medication.

According to a press release, Natania Crane, graduate student at the UIC College of Medicine states, “We believe that increased cross-talk within these networks may reflect a propensity to ruminate on negative occurrences, such as mistake, or a deficit in emotional regulation when faced with a mistake, and our medications may be less effective in helping these types of patients.”

Patients followed up after 10 weeks of using assigned antidepressant therapy, either escitalopram or duloxetine. 

Patients who had more brain activity in either of the brain networks researchers focused on were found less likely to experience reduction of their depressive symptoms on medication over time.  

"Using our model, we were able to predict with a very high degree of accuracy—in fact, 90 percent—which patients would respond well to antidepressant treatment, and which would not," said Scott Langenecker, associate professor of psychology and psychiatry at UIC and corresponding author on the study in a statement.