Increased heart rate in depressed subjects in spite of unchanged autonomic balance?

• Published in: Journal of affective disorders 1998-03, Vol.48 (2), p.115-124
• Main Authors: Moser, Maximilian, Lehofer, Michael, Hoehn-Saric, Rudolf, McLeod, Daniel R, Hildebrandt, Gunther, Steinbrenner, Birgit, Voica, Magdalena, Liebmann, Peter, Zapotoczky, Hans-Georg
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Adult and adolescent clinical studies; Age; Age Factors; Autonomic Nervous System - physiopathology; Autonomous heart rate; Biological and medical sciences; Blood pressure; Cardiac vagal tone; Case-Control Studies; Depression; Depressive Disorder - physiopathology; Electrocardiography; Female; Heart Rate - physiology; Humans; Linear Models; Major depression; Male; Medical sciences; Middle Aged; Mood disorders; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Pulse; Pulse wave velocity; Respiratory sinus arrhythmia
• ISSN: 0165-0327; 1573-2517
• DOI: 10.1016/S0165-0327(97)00164-X

A clinical study was conducted to examine the effects of depression on cardiac autonomic control. Cardiac autonomic control was measured in 26 nonmedicated patients (19 females) suffering from Major Depression, melancholic type, and in 26 age- and sex-matched normal controls. We measured heart rate and high frequency heart rate variability (respiratory sinus arrhythmia), pulsewave velocity and blood pressure, during 10 min of supine rest under controlled conditions. Using a log transformed time domain measure of respiratory sinus arrhythmia (logRSA), we found an inverse linear dependence between cardiac vagal tone and age in the healthy subjects as well as the depressed patients. logRSA was 0.22±0.25 in the patients and 0.25±0.16 in the control group. While this difference was not significant ( P>0.1), the deviations from the regression line were significantly ( P