Predicting anxiety and depression in SAH survivors

  • Research type

    Research Study

  • Full title

    Does admission white cell count (WCC) or red cell distribution width (RDW) predict anxiety or depression in subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH) survivors?

  • IRAS ID

    241528

  • Contact name

    Hiren Patel

  • Contact email

    Hiren.Patel@srft.nhs.uk

  • Duration of Study in the UK

    1 years, 0 months, 0 days

  • Research summary

    Why? This project will assess if it is possible to predict which patients will experience symptoms of anxiety and depression during recovery from subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH). Improving our understanding of the factors involved in recovery could lead to targeted therapies to improve outcome after SAH.

    What? An aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage (aSAH) is a bleed in the brain caused by a weakened blood vessel bursting spontaneously. More patients survive an aSAH now than ever before. As this survival rate has increased, it has been noticed that many patients struggle to return to their ‘normal self’ and can suffer from emotional problems after they return home. It is not known why these problems occur, but it is suspected that they may be linked to a number of factors. We know that after SAH levels of certain proteins or blood cells, known as inflammatory markers are raised after SAH. Blood tests to measure white blood cell counts (WBC) and red cell distribution width (RDW) are markers of inflammation and research has shown that these are significantly higher in depressed groups.

    Who / Where? We will not recruit new participants to this study. We would like to use information stored within a pre-existing clinical database of all aSAH patients admitted to Salford Royal Foundation Trust from 2009 to present day, to examine the association between levels of WBC and RDW in the first 5 days after SAH and reported anxiety and depression at 6 and 12months after SAH. The project will be conducted by members of the clinical team at SRFT and the analysis is expected to take around a year to complete.

  • REC name

    West of Scotland REC 3

  • REC reference

    18/WS/0045

  • Date of REC Opinion

    8 Mar 2018

  • REC opinion

    Favourable Opinion