Family history of major depression and residual symptoms in responder and non-responder depressed patients.

BACKGROUND: Little is known about the extent to which a family history of major depression (MD) affects residual depressive symptoms in responder and non-responder patients suffering from MD. METHODS: Nine hundred eighty-six patients with MD were recruited within the context of a large multicenter project. Information about the family history of MD, as well as about total depressive symptoms and specific depressive clusters, was collected and analyzed. RESULTS: No significant difference was observed in overall depressive symptoms between patients with and those without a family history of MD. However, non-responder patients with a family history of MD showed significantly higher scores in core symptoms as compared with responder patients without a family history of MD. CONCLUSIONS: Non-responder MD patients with a positive family history of MD could represent a slightly different sub-group of MD patients with more consistent core depressive symptoms as compared with responder patients without a family history of MD. However, taking into account the retrospective assessment of data, the use of positive or negative family history as a dichotomous indicator of familial loading and the cross-sectional design of the present study, further research is needed to draw more definitive conclusions.