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The Relationship between Genetic and Precipitating Factors in Depressive Illness

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

John Pollitt
John Pollitt*
Affiliation:
St. Thomas' Hospital, London, S.E.1
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Scientific studies of the families of depressed patients have shown that the risk of development of similar illnesses for close relatives is greater when the illness of the index case began relatively early in life than when it began later. These studies have included both manic-depressive and single episode endogeneous depressions, and no account has been taken of the mode of precipitation of the illnesses. It has been postulated that (a) the penetrance of the gene may be lower in those families with late onset of depression, and (b) that depressive illness may be of diverse aetiology, so that genetically determined forms appear earlier in life and those which are not genetically determined occur later (Hopkinson and Ley 1969).

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 121 , Issue 560 , July 1972 , pp. 67 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1972 

References

Hopkinson, G. (1964). ‘A genetic study of affective illness in patients over 50.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 110, 244–54.Google Scholar
Hopkinson, G., and Ley, P. (1969). ‘A genetic study of affective disorder.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 115, 917–22.Google Scholar
Kay, D. (1959). ‘Observations on the natural history and genetics of old age psychoses.’ Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 52, 791–4.Google Scholar
Pollitt, J. D. (1960). ‘Depression and the functional shift.’ Comprehensive Psychiatry, 1, 381–90.Google Scholar
Pollitt, J. D. (1965). ‘Suggestions for a physiological classification of depression.’ British Journal of Psychiatry, 111, 489–95.Google Scholar
Stenstedt, A. (1952). ‘A study in manic-depressive psychosis: clinical, social and genetic investigations.’ Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, Supplement. 79.Google Scholar
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