Abstract
Study design
Longitudinal.
Objective
With an increased risk of depression in spinal cord injury, the study longitudinally examines depression to understand how post-injury autonomic regulation and coping might be related to somatic and cognitive manifestations of depression after 3 years.
Setting
Indian Spinal Injuries Center.
Methods
Twenty-eight spinal cord injury participants completed the follow-up assessment of the Patient Health Questionnaire 3 years post-injury. The participants were grouped based on post-injury autonomic regulation (high and low HRV) and the somatic and cognitive manifestation of depression reflected in a depression ratio. Wilcoxson signed-rank test tested the post-injury (T1) and 3 year follow–up (T2) depression scores.
Results
Depression score reduced after 3 years of injury (p ≤ 0.05). Only the high HRV group showed a higher depression ratio (somatic/ cognitive) atfollow-up (T2) (p ≤ 0.05). No difference was observed in post-injury coping between high and low HRV groups.
Conclusion
The reduced depression score at follow-up (T2) aligns with the ‘disability paradox’ and mightindicate cognitive adaptation, specifically for those who showed autonomic adaptability in the form of post-injury high autonomic variability.
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Data availability
The datasets generated during and analyzed during the current study are not publicly available to maintain confidentiality as they contain information regarding spinal cord injury patients’ mental well-being. However, these are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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We acknowledge all the Spinal cord injury participants for their participation.
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Conception or design of the work, data analysis and interpretation, drafting the article, critical revision of the article, final approval of the version to be published: VS and SM. Data collection: SM.
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Singh, V., Mitra, S. Autonomic variability, depression and the disability paradox in spinal cord injury. Spinal Cord Ser Cases 8, 76 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41394-022-00542-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41394-022-00542-6
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