Relationship Between Depression After Hemorrhagic Stroke and Auditory Event-Related Potentials in a Chinese Patient Group

PURPOSE: Post-stroke depression (PSD) is the most common psychiatric sequelae of stroke. Numerous studies revealed that event-related potentials (ERP) can reflect depression severity to a certain extent, while there is almost no research on depression after hemorrhagic stroke. Therefore, we employed a prospective cross-sectional study to explore the relationship between ERP and depression after hemorrhagic stroke. METHODS: A total of 74 patients with intracranial hemorrhage were included in this study. Neurological deficits were evaluated using the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) on admission. Depression severity and cognitive impairment were measured using the 17-item Hamilton Depression Scale (HAMD-17) and the Chinese version of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) after two weeks of treatment. All patients were conducted auditory Oddball paradigm for event-related potential mismatch negativity (MMN) and P300. RESULTS: In total, 36 patients were diagnosed with PSD at the two weeks of treatment, for a percentage of 48.6%. Depression severity of ICH patients correlated positively with both the latency of MMN (r = 0.376, P = 0.001) and P300 (r = 0.325, P = 0.005), and correlated negatively with both the amplitude of MMN (r=−0.385, P = 0.001) and P300 (r=−0.311, P = 0.007). Depression severity was negatively correlated with cognitive function after hemorrhagic stroke (r=−0.347, P = 0.002). CONCLUSION: The latency and amplitude of MMN and P300 can well reflect the degree of depression after hemorrhagic stroke, which may help in the early diagnosis and effective treatment of PSD.