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Biomedical subjects

R Lund

Publications and source records attributed to R Lund.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1987

Diurnal variation of mood and the cortisol rhythm in depression and normal states of mind.

A large scale chronobiological investigation was undertaken in 20 drug-free psychiatric inpatients displaying RDC major depression (endogenous subtype) in comparison to 10 healthy control subjects and 10 of the patients after clinical recovery. A series of measurements was taken 6 times a day and, in 8 of a total of 14 variables, also once a night over a period of 10 to 14 days. The following variables were assessed: mood (three different scales), performance (two tests), motor activity (three measures), salivary flow, urinary excretion of water, sodium, potassium, and free cortisol (UFC), and rectal temperature. A phase chart of the acrophases of the 8 variables with measurements taken during day and night revealed two clusters in the depressives and three in the non-depressed subjects. In the depressives, the acrophases of the mood scales clustered around the time of awakening in the morning, together with the acrophase of UFC, whereas all other acrophases clustered in the afternoon. In the non-depressed subjects, however, the mood scales reached their circadian maxima in the middle of the night around the time when sleep was interrupted to take measurements. All other acrophases corresponded roughly with those found in the depressives. The coincidence of the time course of depressed mood and cortisol excretion in the patients was interpreted as reflecting a temporal relationship between diurnal mood swings in depression and the cortisol rhythm. This interpretation was supported by the significant correlation between the acrophases of the two respective rhythms in patients showing a significant diurnal variation in mood. The mood curves of non-depressed subjects seemed unrelated to the cortisol rhythm. Probably, they mirror diurnal fluctuations of vigilance rather than fluctuations of mood. According to the literature, this rhythm is temporally related to the rhythm of melatonin secretion.

Adult↗
PubMed1986

Onset of nocturnal attacks of chronic cluster headache in relation to sleep stages.

Nocturnal attacks are symptomatic of numerous primary headache syndromes. It has proven possible to verify, with polygraphic sleep recordings, a strict correlation between the onset of headache attacks and the rapid eye movements (REM) stage for migraineurs, patients with chronic paroxysmal hemicrania and cluster headache (CH). The purpose of this study was to investigate the correlation between attack onset of chronic CH and sleep stages, the REM stage in particular. Nine patients from our headache outpatient service with a diagnosis of CH were examined in this study. All medication was discontinued at least one week prior to sleep polygraphias, which were conducted in a sleep laboratory on two consecutive nights. Any attacks were treated with oxygen inhalation during the drug-free period. EEG, EMG, and EOG were continuously monitored during the sleep polygraphias. Eight patients had 25 CH attacks during 12 of the 17 nights recorded. Only three of these patients had arousals with attacks in the REM stage and these amounted to five of the 25 recorded attacks. Eleven attacks were in stage 2, four in stage 1 and two in stage 3. These results correlate with recent findings according to which headache attacks were often related to REM in episodic CH, but rarely in the chronic type. Whether or not different pathogenic mechanisms are involved in the episodic and the chronic type of CH is a matter for further discussion.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

Circadian rhythms in endogenous depression.

A comprehensive study of circadian rhythms was carried out in 16 drug-free patients with endogenous depression, 10 of whom were reinvestigated after clinical remission, and 10 healthy controls. No free-running periods were observed in body temperature, urinary excretion of potassium and free cortisol, or any other variable. Moreover, there was little, if any, indication of phase-advance. The circadian variation of several variables was reduced during depression, e.g., motor activity, body temperature, and (less markedly) urinary potassium, but not cortisol. The circadian worsening of mood tended to occur around the time of awakening during depression, i.e., several hours later than after remission or in normal controls. In patients with circadian variation of self-rated mood, the acrophase of this variable correlated significantly with that of urinary free cortisol. This indicates an entrainment of the disease process to the circadian rhythm of cortisol secretion, probably via circadian variations of neurotransmitters in the hypothalamus. The other circadian phenomena observed in depression can adequately be explained by masking effects (negative or positive) of psychopathological symptoms (e.g., early morning awakening) on overt circadian rhythms.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

On the origin of early REM episodes in the sleep of depressed patients: a comparison of three hypotheses.

Shortened latency of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep is a feature frequently observed in depressed patients. Three hypotheses on the origin of early REM sleep episodes propose that short REM latency is due to (1) a phase-shift of one subset of the circadian rhythms relative to other circadian rhythms, (2) a loss of inhibition of REM sleep due to a slow wave sleep deficit, or (3) a reduction in amplitude of a putative circadian arousal cycle. From an analysis of experimental data, it is concluded that the hypothesis of a reduced circadian amplitude best explains the early occurrence of REM sleep.

Arousal↗
PubMed1983

REM latency in neurotic and endogenous depression and the cholinergic REM induction test.

Latency of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep was measured in eight healthy volunteers under baseline conditions and after administration of physostigmine. An infusion of 0.5 mg of physostigmine 5 minutes after sleep onset caused a significant shortening of REM latency in comparison with baseline conditions. In 45 patients with major depression, REM latency during baseline nights was significantly shorter than in control subjects. This shortening of the REM latency was found to be similar in endogenous, neurotic, and unclassified depressed patients. In contrast to findings in the controls, the physostigmine infusion provoked no further significant reduction of REM latency in depressed patients, but awakened the majority of patients. The data concerning spontaneous REM latency and REM latency after physostigmine do not allow a differentiation among the endogenous, neurotic, and unclassified depressed subgroups. The results of the cholinergic REM induction test do not conclusively support the hypothesis of a cholinergic hypersensitivity in depression.

Adult↗
PubMed1983

Sleep onset REM episodes are associated with circadian parameters of body temperature. A study in depressed patients and normal controls.

Sleep and 24-hr body core temperature were measured during a 2- to 3-week study interval in 15 endogenous depressives, 12 patients after remission, and 10 normal control subjects. The total sample was subdivided into one group of persons who displayed at least one sleep onset REM episode (SOREM; latency less than or equal to 20 min) during the study interval and another group of persons who never had SOREMs; 14 persons (8 depressives, 3 remitted patients, and 3 control subjects) belong to the SOREM group, 23 persons (7 depressives, 9 remitted patients, and 7 control subjects) to the group without SOREMs. While the groups do not differ in the mean body core temperature, members of the SOREM group have a significantly smaller variation around the daily mean value. This is mainly due to a smaller difference between daytime and nighttime body temperature in the SOREM group. These data suggest that short REM latency is closely associated with alterations of body core temperature.

Body Temperature↗
PubMed1982

Behavior, attitude, nutrition and endocrinology in anorexia nervosa.

Twenty-four anorexia nervosa patients participated in an inpatient broad spectrum behavior therapy program. The changes in body weight, anorectic behaviors and attitudes and endocrine variables (24-h plasma cortisol, dexamethasone suppression test, 24-h plasma luteinizing hormone) were measured. Data indicate that specific anorectic behaviors and attitudes showed significant improvement during inpatient treatment, while attitudes of a more general neurotic scope such as the feeling of insufficiency, general distress, (sexual) anxieties and anancasm did not. On admission 24-h plasma cortisol levels were elevated, episodic secretory spikes occurred at unusual times and the number was increased, cortisol plasma half-life was increased and non-suppression of cortisol secretion following the application of dexamethasone was observed. All these parameters normalized already after 10% weight gain. 24-h plasma LH pattern showed a close relationship with body weight. Our data suggest that the dysfunctions in anorexia nervosa patients in the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal and -gonadal axis have little specificity for this disease and are mainly a consequence of nutritional factors and starvation. The relationship between cortisol and HL-secretion, behavioral and attitudinal variables and weight gain was more complex than previously suggested by others and a positive relationship between the LH secretory pattern and anorectic symptomatology could be established.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1982

Neuroendocrinological and neurophysiological studies in major depressive disorders: are there biological markers for the endogenous subtype?

The possibility of characterizing subgroups of depressive disorders by biological markers was studied by means of the dexamethasone suppression test (DST), the 24-hr urinary free cortisol (UFC), the growth hormone response to the insulin tolerance test (ITT), and polygraphic sleep recordings. Forty-five hospitalized patients suffering from a moderate to severe nonpsychotic major depressive disorder were clinically subdivided into three groups: endogenous (n = 20), neurotic (n = 19), and "ambiguous" (n = 6). These clinical diagnoses were supplemented by operational diagnostic tools, namely, the Research Diagnostic Criteria (RDC) and the Newcastle Scale. The different diagnostic procedures exhibited a high degree of correspondence. Whereas the results of the ITT were normal in almost all patients, 20% of all patients were dexamethasone nonsuppressors and more than half of the patients showed a shortened REM latency. Both markers did not reveal any specificity for the endogenous subtype. A significant influence of weight loss on the DST and the excretion of UFC was evident.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Temporal coordination of rest-activity cycle, body temperature, urinary free cortisol, and mood in a patient with 48-hour unipolar-depressive cycles in clinical and time-cue-free environments.

During medication-free observation a 66-year-old male patient showed an almost strict alternation of days with depressed mood and days with normal mood. The experiment consisted of two parts; the first was 4 weeks' observation in the psychiatric ward, while the second was 2 weeks' observation in an experimental unit where the patient was deprived of all known information on local time. In the psychiatric ward the observed circadian rhythms, i.e., the rest-activity cycle, the body temperature, the urinary free cortisol, and the mood rhythm, were all synchronized with the geophysical day. Under isolation from time cues the average rest-activity cycle duration was reduced to about 19.5 hr, whereas the body temperature and the urinary free cortisol continued to show rhythms with near-24-hr periods. The main finding of the study is the persistence of a near-48-hr periodicity in the mood fluctuation under isolation from time cues. Besides this, in the time course of body temperature and urinary free cortisol evoked components correlating with the mood cycles were found.

Activity Cycles↗
PubMed1979

[Vegetative functions and motor activity in endogenous depression. Longitudinal study on salivary secretion, temperature, and motor activity in a patient with 48-hour cycles (author's transl)].

Vegetative functions were studied in a 66-year-old-male patient with 48-h unipolar cycles of depression. Salivary secretion, body temperature, and motor activity were measured at 3-h-intervals during the day and once at night. The mood state was assessed by two self-rating scales. There was a regular alternation between 'good' and 'bad' days. Salivary secretion was higher on good days, especially in the morning (P less than 0.002, 10:00). The shape of the 24-h-prolife was different on good and bad days, with a maximum at 10:00 on good at 16:00 on bad days. The mimimum in the night was the same on both good and bad days. Body temperature was increased, as compared with normal subjects (mean 37.2 degrees C) and the diurnal variation was slight. On good days, body temperature during the day was about 0.1 degree C higher than on bad days. Motor activity (arm and leg), registrated by means of the 'activity watch', was higher (during the day) on good days. The present data give some hints for a central dyregulation of vegetative functions in endogenous depression.

Aged↗
PubMed1979

Twenty-four hour sleep-wake pattern of plasma LH in patients with anorexia nervosa.

The 24-h sleep-wake pattern of plasma LH was studied in 18 patients with severe weight loss. Sixteen patients had anorexia nervosa, one suffered from schizophrenia and one had a gastric ulcer. The age of the patients ranged from 13 to 31 years. Seventeen women and one boy participated in the study. Their weight ranged from 51 to 73% of the ideal body weight (IBW) at the first 24-h study which was at one week after admission to the hospital. Blood was taken through an indwelling venous catheter every 30 min. The patients' weight increased under behavioural therapy and they were re-studied when they had gained approximately 10% IBW and again prior to release from the psychiatric ward. The LH patterns were classified as infantile, pubertal or adult. All patients except for two had an infantile pattern at the first study. Except for the two patients who had no anorexia nervosa, all developed a pubertal and/or an adult pattern. All patients whose weight was below 69% IBW had an infantile LH pattern. All patients whose weight was below 69% IBW had an infantile LH pattern. Adult patterns were only seen when the body weight was greater than 80% IBW. The increase of the average 24-h LH values was slower the older the patients were and the longer they had been anorectic.

Adolescent↗