In the News

Warren Taylor, M.D., James G Blakemore Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, served as an author on the recently published article "Influences of resting-state intrinsic functional brain connectivity on the antidepressant treatment response in late-life depression." The article appears in the journal Psychological Medicine and details how connectivity between brain regions measured before treatment may predict response to common antidepressant medications.  This work was led by Mr.

James G Blakemore Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences Warren Taylor, M.D., and his team recently worked with engineering collaborators at Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt medical student Ryan Ahmed to examine a deep learning method that could estimate accelerated brain aging.  While accelerated brain aging in depressed older adults was associated with disability and cognitive performance, it was not predictive of response to antidepressant medication. Learn more here.

Warren D. Taylor, M.D., MHSc, James G Blakemore Professor of Psychiatry, served as lead author of a new publication proposing how dysfunction in the dopamine system may influence depression in older adults. This may influence risk for depression but also serve as a new target for treatment.  The manuscripts provides the rationale for a current multi-site study being conducted at Vanderbilt examining the effect of levodopa (Sinemet) on late-life depression. The paper appears in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. 

Fourth-year resident in General Psychiatry Seth Christman, MD, and James G Blakemore Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Warren Taylor, MD, MHSc, recently published the article "Accelerated brain aging predicts impaired cognitive performance and greater disability in geriatric but not midlife adult depression" in the journal Translational Psychiatry.

Warren D. Taylor, M.D., MHSc, and Jennifer U. Blackford, Ph.D., professors of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, have written a new publication detailing the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health of front-line clinicians.  The manuscript, published in The Annals of Internal Medicine, describes physiological changes that occur with stress that lead to burnout and mental health disorders.  It challenges many providers' reluctance to seek treatment and proposes strategies to maintain mental health.

As the percentage of U.S. adults older than 65 years continues to grow, so too does the need for preventing mental illness among older adults as well as improving clinical services and outcomes for older patients with psychiatric disorders. Psychiatry's obligation to treat this population, and an agenda for research and enhancement of clinical services, is outlined by Warren D. Taylor, M.D., M.H.Sc., James G. Blakemore Professor of Psychiatry and Director, Division of General Psychiatry, and Charles F.

A Vanderbilt University Medical Center pilot study of treating late-life depression in nonsmokers with transdermal nicotine (nicotine patch) has yielded some promising results, but the study’s author cautions that more study is needed. Late-life depression — depression that occurs in adults 60 years or older — is characterized by poor response to antidepressant medications and often memory issues. About half of those treated for late-life depression fail to respond to initial treatments.

Yi Deng, M.D., resident in Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, and Warren Taylor, M.D., professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, have worked together to publish a paper titled "Predictors of recurrence in remitted late-life depression" in the journal Depression and Anxiety. The paper examines factors in older adults that may predict the return of depression after successful antidepressant treatment.  Click here to view the abstract.

Meghan Riddle, M.D., Assistant Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, and Warren Taylor, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, were among the authors of an article titled "Longitudinal cognitive outcomes of clinical phenotypes of late-life depression," published recently in the March issue of The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry.