Why You Should Focus On Enhancing Personalized Depression Treatment
Personalized Depression Treatment
Traditional therapy and medication don't work for a majority of people who are depressed. A customized treatment could be the answer.
Cue is an intervention platform for digital devices that transforms passively acquired smartphone sensor data into personalized micro-interventions that improve mental health. We parsed the best-fit personalized ML models for each subject using Shapley values to identify their feature predictors and reveal distinct features that are able to change mood as time passes.
Predictors of Mood
Depression is the leading cause of mental illness in the world.1 Yet, only half of those affected receive treatment. In order to improve outcomes, doctors must be able to identify and treat patients with the highest chance of responding to specific treatments.
Personalized depression treatment is one method of doing this. Researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago are developing new methods for predicting which patients will gain the most from certain treatments. They are using sensors for mobile phones as well as a voice assistant that incorporates artificial intelligence, and other digital tools. With two grants awarded totaling over $10 million, they will use these technologies to identify biological and behavioral predictors of the response to antidepressant medication and psychotherapy.
So far, the majority of research on factors that predict depression treatment effectiveness [https://nerdgaming.science/wiki/20_best_tweets_of_all_time_about_depression_treatment_breakthroughs] has centered on clinical and sociodemographic characteristics. These include demographics like age, gender and education, and clinical characteristics like symptom severity and comorbidities as well as biological markers.
While many of these factors can be predicted from the information available in medical records, few studies have utilized longitudinal data to determine predictors of mood in individuals. Few also take into account the fact that moods vary significantly between individuals. Therefore, it is critical to develop methods that permit the recognition of different mood predictors for each person and the effects of treatment.
The team's new approach uses daily, in-person evaluations of mood and lifestyle variables using a smartphone app called AWARE, a cognitive evaluation with the BiAffect app and electroencephalography -- an imaging technique that monitors brain activity. The team can then develop algorithms to detect patterns of behaviour and emotions that are unique to each person.
In addition to these methods, the team developed a machine-learning algorithm to model the dynamic variables that influence each person's mood. The algorithm combines these individual variations into a distinct "digital phenotype" for each participant.
The digital phenotype was associated with CAT-DI scores, which is a psychometrically validated scale for assessing severity of symptom. However the correlation was not strong (Pearson's r = 0.08, the BH-adjusted p-value was 3.55 x 10-03) and varied widely across individuals.
Predictors of symptoms
depression treatment online is one of the leading causes of disability1, but it is often not properly diagnosed and treated. In addition an absence of effective interventions and stigmatization associated with depression disorders hinder many individuals from seeking help.
To aid in the development of a personalized treatment plan in order to provide a more personalized treatment, identifying patterns that can predict symptoms is essential. The current methods for predicting symptoms rely heavily on clinical interviews, which are not reliable and only detect a few symptoms associated with depression.
Machine learning can improve the accuracy of the diagnosis and treatment of depression by combining continuous digital behavioral phenotypes gathered from smartphones with a validated mental health tracker online (the Computerized Adaptive Testing Depression Inventory CAT-DI). Digital phenotypes can provide continuous, high-resolution measurements. They also capture a variety of distinct behaviors and patterns that are difficult to record using interviews.
The study included University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) students with mild to severe depressive symptoms participating in the Screening and Treatment for Anxiety and Depression (STAND) program29, which was developed under the UCLA Depression Grand Challenge. Participants were referred to online support or to clinical treatment based on the severity of their depression. Patients who scored high on the CAT-DI of 35 or 65 were assigned online support via a peer coach, while those with a score of 75 patients were referred to psychotherapy in person.
Participants were asked a series questions at the beginning of the study concerning their psychosocial and demographic characteristics as well as their socioeconomic status. These included age, sex, education, work, and financial status; whether they were divorced, married, or single; current suicidal ideation, intent or attempts; and the frequency with the frequency they consumed alcohol. Participants also rated their level of depression severity on a 0-100 scale using the CAT-DI. The CAT-DI test was performed every two weeks for participants who received online support, and weekly for those who received in-person assistance.
Predictors of the Reaction to Treatment
The development of a personalized depression treatment is currently a top research topic and many studies aim at identifying predictors that will allow clinicians to identify the most effective medications for each patient. Pharmacogenetics, in particular, uncovers genetic variations that affect how the human body metabolizes drugs. This lets doctors select the medication that are most likely to work for each patient, reducing the time and effort needed for trials and errors, while avoiding any side negative effects.
Another option is to create predictive models that incorporate the clinical data with neural imaging data. These models can be used to determine the variables that are most likely to predict a specific outcome, such as whether a medication can help with symptoms or mood. These models can also be used to predict a patient's response to an existing treatment for depression uk which allows doctors to maximize the effectiveness of treatment currently being administered.
A new generation of machines employs machine learning techniques like supervised and classification algorithms such as regularized logistic regression, and tree-based methods to integrate the effects of multiple variables to improve the accuracy of predictive. These models have been shown to be useful in predicting the outcome of treatment, such as response to antidepressants. These methods are becoming more popular in psychiatry and will likely be the norm in future clinical practice.
In addition to the ML-based prediction models research into the mechanisms behind depression continues. Recent findings suggest that the disorder is connected with neurodegeneration in particular circuits. This suggests that the treatment for depression will be individualized built around targeted treatments that target these circuits in order to restore normal function.
Internet-delivered interventions can be an effective method to accomplish this. They can provide a more tailored and individualized experience for patients. One study found that a web-based program was more effective than standard treatment in alleviating symptoms and ensuring the best quality of life for those with MDD. A randomized controlled study of an individualized treatment for depression showed that a substantial percentage of participants experienced sustained improvement and fewer side consequences.
Predictors of side effects
A major challenge in personalized depression treatment is predicting which antidepressant medications will have minimal or no side effects. Many patients are prescribed a variety of medications before finding a medication that is both effective and well-tolerated. Pharmacogenetics provides a novel and exciting method of selecting antidepressant drugs that are more effective and precise.
Many predictors can be used to determine which antidepressant to prescribe, including gene variants, phenotypes of patients (e.g. gender, sex or ethnicity) and comorbidities. However finding the most reliable and accurate factors that can predict the effectiveness of a particular treatment will probably require randomized controlled trials of considerably larger samples than those that are typically part of clinical trials. This is due to the fact that the identification of interactions or moderators can be a lot more difficult in trials that take into account a single episode of treatment per patient instead of multiple sessions of treatment over a period of time.
In addition, predicting a patient's response will likely require information on comorbidities, symptom profiles and the patient's personal perception of the effectiveness and tolerability. Currently, only some easily identifiable sociodemographic and clinical variables seem to be reliable in predicting the severity of MDD factors, including age, gender, race/ethnicity and SES, BMI, the presence of alexithymia, and the severity of depressive symptoms.
Many challenges remain when it comes to the use of pharmacogenetics to treat depression treatment free. First is a thorough understanding of the genetic mechanisms is essential and an understanding of what constitutes a reliable predictor for treatment response. Ethics such as privacy and the responsible use of genetic information should also be considered. In the long term pharmacogenetics can provide an opportunity to reduce the stigma that surrounds mental health treatment and improve treatment outcomes for those struggling with depression. But, like all approaches to psychiatry, careful consideration and planning is essential. In the moment, it's ideal to offer patients various depression medications that are effective and urge them to talk openly with their doctor.