Cognitive impairment and depression

Abstract

The commonality of cognitive impairment and depression is discussed. Cognitive symptoms are the main symptoms of depressive disorder  and, most often, it is cognitive  impairment that  reduces  the performance and quality of life of depressed patients. The most common  cognitive  disorders  in depressed patients are: attention deficit (both visual and auditory), decrease in the  level of short-term and operative  memory, difficulties in processing  information  of any modality, a decrease in the speed of information processing, as well as difficulties in building an activity program and monitoring her execution. A cognitive symptom that requires further  discussion  is the so-called  cognitive  distortion  – a shift in focus from positive  to negative  stimuli, as well as incorrect reactions  to negative  feedback and decision making. A depressive  episode  develops  against  the background  of dysmetabolic and dysfunctional  cerebral  changes  in the  amygdala,  cingulate  cortex, hippocampus,  orbitofrontal and  mediobasal frontal  cortex. Cognitive impairment in patients who have had depression persists  after recovery from depression;  according  to the figurative expression  adopted in the scientific community of specialists  studying cognitive impairment in depression, each depressive  episode  forms permanent “cognitive scars”. Presumably, cognitive  dysfunction  may be one of the  risk factors  for the  development of a depressive  disorder; depression, in turn, is a risk factor for the development of dementia, including in Alzheimer’s disease and cerebrovascular disease: studies  have shown that the transformation of severe cognitive impairment associated with depression into dementia in elderly patients can reach 70% in five years. The undoubted commonality of depression and cognitive dysfunction is emphasized by the frequency of depression in patients with cognitive impairment.