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Working memory associated with anti-suicidal ideation effect of repeated-dose intravenous ketamine in depressed patients

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Abstract

Suicide is a tremendous threat to global public health, and a large number of people who committed suicide suffered the pain of mental diseases, especially major depressive disorder (MDD). Previous study showed that ketamine could reduce suicidal ideation (SI), potentially by improving the impaired working memory (WM). The objective of current study was to illuminate the relationship between WM and SI in MDD with repeated ketamine treatment. MDD patients with SI (n = 59) and without SI (n = 37) completed six intravenous infusions of ketamine (0.5 mg/kg over 40 min) over 12 days (Day 1, 3, 5, 8, 10 and 12). The severity of depressive symptoms, SI and WM were assessed at baseline, day 13 and day 26. We found that WM was significantly improved after 6 ketamine infusions (F = 161.284, p = 0.009) in a linear mixed model. Correlation analysis showed that the improvement of depressive symptom was significantly associated with WM at baseline (r =  − 0.265, p = 0.042) and the reduction in SSI-part I was related to the change of WM (r = 0.276, p = 0.034) in the MDD patients with SI. Furthermore, Logistic regression analysis showed that improvement in WM might predict the anti-SI response of ketamine. Our findings suggest that the improvement of working memory may partly account for the anti-SI effect of ketamine, and intervention of improving working memory function may be capable of reducing suicidal ideation.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We thank for all the participants in this trial and contributions of all investigators. We thank the National Science Foundation of China (81701341, 81801345, 81801343), Science and Technology Department of Guangdong Province major science and technology (2016B010108003), Grant of Guangzhou Municipal Science and Technology Bureau (201904010354), and Key Laboratory for Innovation Platform Plan, Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou, China.

Funding

This study was supported by the National Science Foundation of China (81801345,81801343), Science and Technology Department of Guangdong Province major science and technology (2016B010108003), Grant of Guangzhou Municipal Science and Technology Bureau (201904010354), the International Communication Foundation Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (16410722500),Guangzhou Municipal Psychiatry Disease Clinical Transformation Laboratory (201805010009), China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2018M640769), and Key Laboratory for Innovation platform Plan, Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou, China. The funding source had no role in the study design, analysis or interpretation of data or in the preparation of the report or decision to publish. We thank for all the participants in this trial and contributions of all investigators.

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Author notes

  1. Xiaoyu Chen, Mingqia Wang and Yiru Hu contributed to this work equally.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Affiliated Brain Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou Huiai Hospital, Guangzhou, 510370, China

    Xiaoyu Chen, Mingqia Wang, Yiru Hu, Yanni Zhan, Yanling Zhou, Wei Zheng, Weijian Liu, Chengyu Wang, Xiaomei Zhong, Hanqiu Li, Xiaofeng Lan, Yuping Ning & Bin Zhang

  2. Guangdong Engineering Technology Research Center for Translational Medicine of Mental Disorders, Mingxin Rd.36, Guangzhou, 510370, Guangdong, China

    Xiaoyu Chen, Mingqia Wang, Yiru Hu, Yanni Zhan, Yanling Zhou, Wei Zheng, Weijian Liu, Chengyu Wang, Xiaomei Zhong, Hanqiu Li, Xiaofeng Lan, Yuping Ning & Bin Zhang

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  1. Xiaoyu Chen
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  2. Mingqia Wang
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Contributions

YN and BZ designed the study and wrote the protocol. All authors participated in the data collection. XC and MW undertook the statistical analysis and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. BZ helped revise the manuscript. All authors contributed to and have approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yuping Ning.

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The authors declared that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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Chen, X., Wang, M., Hu, Y. et al. Working memory associated with anti-suicidal ideation effect of repeated-dose intravenous ketamine in depressed patients. Eur Arch Psychiatry Clin Neurosci 271, 431–438 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00406-020-01221-z

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