The relation between depression after acute stroke and lesion location

Objectives: Stroke which is one of the major causes of morbidity, affects functional improvement negatively because of mood changes especially depression after stroke. There are articles in the literature about relationship between poststroke depression and lesion location. But this relationship is still unclear. In this study, we aimed to investigate the relation between depression after stroke and lesion location in acute phase after stroke.

Method: A hundred thirty-one patients in two weeks after stroke were included in the study. Beck Depression Scale, Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI) were applied to recruited patients. Sociodemographic features of patients, side of lesion (right or left) and lesion location were also recorded.

Results: 49 of 131 acute stroke patients (37.4%) were female and 82 of patients (62.6%) were male. Mean of age was 62.6±15.1 years and interval of age was 23-90 years. Mean of BDS points was 14.72±11.2. Depression levels of 49.6 percent of patients were mild to moderate, 13 percent of patients were severe according to BDS scores. 35.1 percent of patients were depressed according to the cut off score of BDS (cut off score=17). Left sided lesions and subcortical lesions were more in the depressed group. According to lobar location, patients who had frontal, temporal, parietal, occipital and caudal lesions had higher BDS scores. This relation was statistically significant for parietal lesions (p<0.05).

Conclusion: According to these results, left sided lesions and subcortical lesions can predispose to depression more. Patients who have parietal lesions must be handled exactly in terms of depression. Studies about relationship between depression and parietal lobe are few and further investigations must be done