Journal

The Japanese journal of neuropsychology

[Vol.20 No.1 contents]
Japanese/English

Full Text of this Article
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ArticleTitle Vascular dementia and depression -understanding the pathophysiology and treatment
Language J
AuthorList Shin-ichi Niwa
Affiliation Department of Neuropsychiatry, Fukushima Medical University School of Medicine
Publication Japanese Journal of Neuropsychology: 20 (1), 44-50, 2004
Received
Accepted
Abstract Recently, the incidence of depression caused by cerebral vascular disorders has increased among elderly individuals. Post-stroke depression (PSD) is representative of this type of depression. Regarding PSD, it has been found that PSD is triggered by biological events including disorders of the aminergic neurons. Other conditions than PSD have recently been delineated among those caused by cerebrovascular disorders. The relevant conditions as a whole are referred to 'vascular depression (VD)'. It is proposed that the multiple infarct is a causative factor for vascular depression (VD). In the treatment of VD, not only improvement of nuclear symptoms but also aleviation of accompanying symptoms is required. In the present paper, evidence is shown that nicergoline is effective for the treatment of accompanying symptoms to VD, which should be regarded as the first choice medicine for VD because nicergoline is proved that it has an effect of improving cerebral circulation and it has activating effects of dopaminergic as well as cholinergic systems.
Keywords cerebrovascular dementia, post-stroke depression, vascular depression, nicergoline

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