Imaging Vulnerability To Bipolar Disorder
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Imaging Vulnerability To Bipolar Disorder In Individuals at High Familial Risk
IRAS ID
137824
Contact name
Beata Godlewska
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Oxford
Research summary
Bipolar disorder (BD) is a major mental health problem producing significant lifetime morbidity and mortality. Pathological processes are believed to begin at the neural level years before clinical symptoms are present. Identification of individuals at high risk of BD as early as possible, even before clear clinical manifestations are present, is of utmost importance and it would not only help the diagnostic process but also enable prevention and early treatment. However, despite a strong evidence for a correlation between the time of untreated illness and recurrence rates, disorder severity, neuropsychological and functional dysfunction and poorer response to treatments, currently there is a gap of 10 years between the first presentation of symptoms and first treatment.
An important group of people at high risk of developing BD are the offspring of patients with BD. People who have a 1st degree relative (eg. a parent) with a diagnosis of BD are thus a suitable group for seeking biomarkers of pathological processes underpinning BD and may themselves benefit from potential findings.
We would like to propose a study that would explore differences between such people at high familial risk of BD and people at normal population risk, ie. people whose parents do not suffer from any mental disorder, with the aim of searching for biomarkers - ie. measurable characteristics that reflect the presence of pathological processes - of predisposition to this disorder. In this study we plan to explore possible structural changes in the brain, with the special focus on white matter structure, brain connectivity and brain biochemistry, as well as dysregulations in reward processing and the use of imagery and to correlate them with mood changes over the following 4 years.REC name
South Central - Oxford C Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/SC/0187
Date of REC Opinion
28 May 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion