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Chapter 11 - The Common Ancestors of Anxiety and Depression: Comorbidity as a Cognitive, Behavioural, Neural and Cellular Phenotype, and Current Evidence for Photobiomodulation as a Novel Treatment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 May 2024

By
Gabriel Barg ,
Julia N. Lukacs  and
Guillermo Perez Algorta
Edited by
Allan Young ,
Marsal Sanches ,
Jair C. Soares  and
Mario Juruena
Allan Young
Affiliation:
Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London
Marsal Sanches
Affiliation:
Baylor College of Medicine, Texas
Jair C. Soares
Affiliation:
McGovern Medical School, The University of Texas
Mario Juruena
Affiliation:
King's College London
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Summary

The COVID-19 pandemic resurfaced and potentially exacerbated the issue of comorbidities in mental health, with anxiety and depression being a prominent example. The co-occurrence of these conditions may exceed 50%, while there is also an overlap in treatment options and challenges in treatment response. This is supported by evidence indicating similarities between mood and anxiety across multiple dimensions, including cognitive, behavioural, neurobiological, and intracellular mechanisms. Cognitive commonalities primarily refer to attentional and recollection biases towards threatening stimuli and negative information. Behavioural inhibition due to avoidance or reduced motivation is another similarity of anxiety and depression. Shared neurobiological mechanisms include amygdala hyper-reactivity and dysregulation of the HPA axis. At a cellular level, mitochondrial dysfunctions might be underlying stress response and the mechanisms responsible for stress adaptation and regulation. Novel therapeutics, such as photobiomodulation (PBM), have been informed by these mechanistic models.

Keywords

COVID-19depressionanxietycognitivebehaviouralneuralcellularphotobiomodulation (PBM)
Type
Chapter
Information
Clinical Textbook of Mood Disorders , pp. 116 - 124
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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