Takeaway
- This meta-analysis suggests that the prevalence of prestroke depression is markedly lower than the depression prevalence observed after a stroke.
- Prestroke depression is an important and relevant clinical variable regarding the development of poststroke depression.
Why this matters
- The risk of developing depression is higher in patients with stroke and having depression prior to stroke only increases the risk.
- On this basis, it is important that clinicians are aware of the relevance of prestroke depression to the potential development of depression poststroke.
Study design
- Meta-analysis of 29 studies (n=1,64,993) identified after a search across Medline, EMBASE, psycINFO, Web of Science, and CINAHL databases.
- Funding: Stroke Association and Chief Scientist Office Scotland.
Results
- The pooled prevalence of prestroke depression was 11.6% (95% CI, 9.2-14.7).
- Prevalence of prestroke depression with assessment method for clinical interview (17.3%; 95% CI, 13.1-22.6) was higher compared with method for self-reports (10.7%; 95% CI, 7.4-15.2) and medical record or charts (9.4%; 95% CI, 6.2-14.0).
- Prestroke depression was associated with increased risk for poststroke depression (OR, 3.0; 95% CI, 2.3-4.0).
- The strength of evidence to support estimate of association was ‘very low’.
Limitations
- Heterogeneity among included studies.
References
References
