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Prefrontal repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation as add on treatment in depression
  1. M García-Toroa,
  2. A Pascual-Leoneb,c,
  3. M Romeraa,
  4. A Gonzáleza,
  5. J Micóa,
  6. O Ibarraa,
  7. H Arnillasa,
  8. I Caplloncha,
  9. A Mayola,
  10. J M Tormosc
  1. aComplejo Hospitalario de Mallorca, C/ Jesús nº 40, 07010 Palma de Mallorca, Spain, bLaboratory for Magnetic Brain Stimulation, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, 330 Brookline Avenue, Kirstein Building KS 454, Boston, MA 02215, USA, cBioengineering Institute, University Miguel Hernandez, Alicante, Spain
  1. Dr M Garcia-Toro, C/ Paseo Marítimo 37 6º J, 07014 Palma de Mallorca, Spainmagato{at}intersalud.es

Abstract

A growing number of studies report antidepressant effects of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) in patients with major depression. The hypothesis that high frequency (20 Hz) rTMS (HF-rTMS) may speed up and strengthen the therapeutic response to sertraline in MD was tested. Twenty eight patients who had not yet received medication for the present depressive episode (n=12) or had failed a single trial of an antidepressant medication (n=16) were started on sertraline and randomised to receive either real of sham HF-rTMS. HF-rTMS was applied to the left dorsolateral prefrontal area in daily sessions (30 trains of 2 s, 20–40 s intertrain interval, at 90% motor threshold) on 10 consecutive working days. The results suggest that in this patient population, HF-rTMS does not add efficacy over the use of standard antidepressant medication.

  • major depression
  • transcranial magnetic stimulation
  • sertraline
  • prefrontal area

https://doi.org/10.1136/jnnp.71.4.546

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