2014 Volume 26 Issue 3 Pages 278-286
Background: Alexithymia has been reported to hinder psychotherapeutic outcome. However, whether alexithymia influences the pharmacotherapeutic outcome of patients with major depression is unknown. The purpose of this study was to explore whether alexithymia predicts the prognosis of major depression patients treated with pharmacotherapy.
Methods: A prospective study was undertaken in 26 inpatients with major depression. Patients were treated with pharmacotherapy in a naturalistic setting. At baseline, the patients' scores on the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and the Zung Self-rating Depression Scale (SDS) and other sociodemographic and medical data were obtained. Six months after discharge, outcome data (presence or absence of being at work and presence or absence of readmission after discharge) were obtained.
Results: A logistic regression analysis revealed that low TAS-20 scores and being unmarried were associated with being at work at 6 months after discharge in the participants. No factor was significantly associated with the presence of readmission in this sample.
Conclusions: Our findings suggested that alexithymia might be associated with the six-month prognosis in patients with major depression treated with pharmacotherapy. Individual traits such as alexithymia should be taken into account when we formulate the strategy to improve the prognosis of patients with major depression.
