Am J Psychiatry 1989; 146:743-748
Copyright © 1989 by American Psychiatric Association
TSH response to TRH in depression with and without panic attacks
GM Gillette, JC Garbutt and DE Quade
Clinical Research Unit, Dorothea Dix Hospital, Raleigh, NC 27611.
Low thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) response to thyrotropin-releasing
hormone (TRH) has been repeatedly described in approximately 25% of
patients with major depression. Panic disorder appears related to
depression along several dimensions, including prevalence of low TSH
response to TRH. The authors divided 46 patients with primary unipolar
depression by gender and by presence or absence of concurrent panic attacks
and compared their TRH test results with those of 106 normal control
subjects, controlling for confounding variables. Depressed patients with
panic had higher prevalence of low TSH response and significantly lower
mean TSH response than depressed patients without panic. The latter were
indistinguishable from normal control subjects.
