Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment (Dec 2019)
MicroRNA-Based Biomarkers in the Diagnosis and Monitoring of Therapeutic Response in Patients with Depression
Abstract
Ya-Yun Xu,1–4 Qian-Hui Xia,5 Qing-Rong Xia,1,3,4 Xu-Lai Zhang,6,7 Jun Liang1,3,4 1Department of Pharmacy, Hefei Fourth People’s Hospital, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of China; 2CAS Key Laboratory of Brain Function and Disease, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230022, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Psychopharmacology, Anhui Mental Health Center, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of China; 4Department of Clinical Pharmacy, Affiliated Psychological Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of China; 5School of Pharmacy, Wannan Medical College, Wuhu 241002, People’s Republic of China; 6Department of Geriatric Psychology, Hefei Fourth People’s Hospital, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of China; 7Clinical School of Mental Health, Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Jun LiangDepartment of Pharmacy, Hefei Fourth People’s Hospital, 316 Huangshan Road, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of ChinaTel/Fax +86 551 63616022Email [email protected] ZhangDepartment of Geriatric Psychology, Hefei Fourth People’s Hospital, 316 Huangshan Road, Hefei 230000, People’s Republic of ChinaTel/Fax +86 551 63616022Email [email protected]: Depression is a debilitating mental illness that affects up to 120 million people worldwide; it is currently determined based on subjective diagnostic schemes that are limited by high uncertainty. Hence, there is an urgent need to identify effective and reliable biomarkers to increase diagnostic accuracy. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) constitute a recently discovered class of non-coding RNAs that play a key role in the regulation of gene expression by modulating translation, messenger RNA (mRNA) degradation, or stability of mRNA targets. Dysregulated expression of miRNAs is being investigated as a clinical biomarker for a variety of diseases, including depression. Accumulating evidence has shown that miRNAs participate in many aspects of neural plasticity, neurogenesis, and the stress response. This is supported by more direct studies based on human postmortem brain tissue that strongly indicate that miRNAs not only play a key role in the pathogenesis of major depressive disorder, but also present potential for the development of therapeutic targets. miRNAs in the peripheral and central nervous system are being considered as potential biomarkers in the diagnosis of depression and in monitoring the therapeutic response to antidepressants, owing to their stability, tissue-specificity, and disease-specific expression. In this review, we focus on various miRNAs in tissues and fluids that could be employed as diagnostic and therapeutic biomarkers in patients with depression.Keywords: depression, microRNA, biomarker, diagnosis, therapy
