Antidepressant Effects Are More Rapid, Dramatic Than Thought

A single dose of a commonly prescribed antidepressant drug quickly and dramatically changes how "in sync" different parts of the brain are, new research suggests. Scientists analyzed the brain's so-called "functional connectivity," which is a measure of how synchronized brain activity is in different areas. The results showed a dramatic decrease in functional connectivity across the whole brain within just three hours of when participants took a type of antidepressant medication known as a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI). "We were not expecting the SSRI to have such a prominent effect on such a short timescale, or for the resulting signal to encompass the entire brain," said study researcher Dr. Julia Sacher, of the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Germany. Read More http://ift.tt/1rhJxFR