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. 2022 Sep 19:26:100518.
doi: 10.1016/j.bbih.2022.100518. eCollection 2022 Dec.

Anti-inflammatory medications for the treatment of mental disorders: A scoping review

Affiliations

Anti-inflammatory medications for the treatment of mental disorders: A scoping review

Rebecca Fitton et al. Brain Behav Immun Health. .

Abstract

This scoping review assessed the effect of anti-inflammatory medications in mental disorders. A search in Medline and the Cochrane database focusing on randomised controlled trials and systematic reviews identified 53 primary research articles, conducted in major depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and somatic symptom disorders and related disorders (SSRD). The findings suggest that there is scope to consider the use of anti-inflammatory agents in mental disorders, however, not as a one-size-fits-all solution. Treatment could be especially helpful in subgroups with evidence of baseline inflammation. Anti-inflammatory medications that seem mostly effective in bipolar disorder or major depressive disorder, such as Celecoxib, Pioglitazone and statins, may differ from the ones with indications of effectiveness in schizophrenia, such as Minocycline and Aspirin. This might suggest a different underlying mechanism for treatment success in those two main illness groups. Further studies with larger sample sizes are needed that take levels of inflammation markers into account.

Keywords: Anti-inflammatory treatment; Inflammation; Mental health; Scoping review; Somatic symptoms.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

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Fig. 1
Prisma diagram.

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