Cognitive dysfunction in bipolar disorder

Current Opinion in Psychiatry

Volumn 16, Issue 1, 2003, Pages 7-12

  Chowdhury, Rumana ^a   Ferrier, I Nicol ^a   Thompson, Jill Maria ^a  

^a ROYAL VICTORIA INFIRMARY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

Bipolar disorder; Cognitive function; Euthymic; High risk; Prefrontal cortex

Indexed keywords

ATTENTION; BIPOLAR DISORDER; COGNITIVE DEFECT; DEPRESSION; DISEASE CLASSIFICATION; DISEASE COURSE; HIGH RISK POPULATION; HUMAN; LEARNING; MANIA; MEMORY; NEUROPATHOLOGY; NEUROPSYCHOLOGICAL TEST; NUCLEAR MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING; POSITRON EMISSION TOMOGRAPHY; PREFRONTAL CORTEX; REMISSION; REVIEW; SCHIZOPHRENIA; STRIATE CORTEX;

EID: 0037225461     PISSN: 09517367     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1097/00001504-200301000-00003     Document Type: Review

References (44)

1. Bearden CE, Hoffman KM, Cannon TD. The neuropsychology and neuro-anatomy of bipolar affective disorder: a critical review. Bipolar Disord 2001; 3:106-150. This excellent review provides a comprehensive discussion of both neuropsychological and neuroanatomical findings in bipolar disorder. The authors integrate the available data and suggest valuable ideas for future studies.
2. Borkowska A, Rybakowski JK. Neuropsychological frontal lobe tests indicate that bipolar depressed patients are more impaired than unipolar. Bipolar Disord 2001; 3:88-94. This interesting paper discusses differences in cognitive performance between unipolar and bipolar patients during the depressive state.
3. Neu P, Kiesslinger U, Schlattmann P, Reischies FM. Time-related cognitive deficiency in four different types of depression. Psychiatry Res 2001; 103:237-247.
4. Clark LD, Iversen SD, Goodwin G. A neuropsychological investigation of prefrontal cortex involvement in acute mania. Am J Psychiatry 2001; 158:1605-1611. This is one of a few of studies that focused on neuropsychological function in mania rather than depression.
5. Basso MR, Lowery N, Neel J, et al. Neuropsychological impairment among manic, depressed and mixed-episode inpatients with bipolar disorder. Neuropsychology 2002; 16:84-91. This paper addresses the nature of the cognitive profile across different mood states in bipolar disorder.
6. Martinez-Aran A, Penades R, Vieta E, et al. Executive function in patients with remitted bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and its relationship with functional outcome. Psychother Psychosom 2002; 71:39-46. This paper addresses the relationship between deficits in the executive domain and psychosocial functioning in bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, and the implications that this may have for patient management.
7. Seidman LJ, Kremen WS, Koren D, et al. A comparative profile analysis of neuropsychological functioning in patients with schizophrenia and bipolar psychoses. Schizophr Res 2002; 53:31-44. This study is one of the few to administer a comprehensive neuropsychological test battery to bipolar and schizophrenic patients. The authors also discuss the implications of similar cognitive impairments in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
8. Crow TJ. The continuum of psychosis and its genetic origins. The Sixty Fifth Maudsley Lecture. Br J Psychiatry 1990; 156:788-797.
9. Dickerson FB, Sommerville J, Origoni AE, et al. Outpatients with schizophrenia and bipolar I disorder: do they differ in their cognitive and social functioning. Psychiatry Res 2001; 102:21-27. This study provides evidence for an overlap in the cognitive profile between schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Potential nosological implications are discussed.
10. Zubieta JK, Huguelet P, O'Neil RL, Giodarni BJ. Cognitive function in euthymic bipolar I disorder. Psychiatry Res 2001; 102:9-20. This is a methodologically robust study conducted in a homogeneous sample of patients. The authors discuss the evidence for a range of cognitive deficits in patients with bipolar disorder type I.
11. El-Badri SM, Ashton CH, Moore PB, et al. Electrophysiological and cognitive function in young euthymic patients with bipolar affective disorder. Bipolar Disord 2001; 3:79-87. This study explores cognitive deficits in bipolar disorder in relation to electrophysiological changes.
12. Clark L, Iversen SD, Goodwin GM. Sustained attention deficit in bipolar disorder. Br J Psychiatry 2002; 180:313-319. This paper discusses the finding of a persistent sustained attention deficit in bipolar disorder within the context of neuroanatomy and vulnerability markers.
13. Wilder-Willis KE, Sax KW, Rosenberg HL, et al. Persistent attentional dysfunction in remitted bipolar disorder. Bipolar Disord 2001; 3:58-62. This is one of a few recent papers to illustrate that attentional dysfunction persists in bipolar patients during the remitted state.
14. Baddeley A. Working memory. Oxford: Clarendon Press; 1986.
15. Goldman-Rakic PS. Circuitry of primate prefrontal cortex and regulation of behaviour by representational memory. In: Plum F, Mountcastle V, editors. Handbook of physiology. Bethesda, MD: American Physiological Society; 1987. pp 373-417.
16. Thompson JM, Gray JM, Hughes JH, et al. A component process analysis of working memory dysfunction in bipolar affective disorder [abstract]. Bipolar Disord 2001; 3:60.
17. Ferrier IN, Stanton BR, Kelly TP, et al. Neuropsychological function in euthymic patients with bipolar disorder. Br J Psychiatry 1999; 175:246-251.
18. Harmer CJ, Clark L, Grayson L, Goodwin GM. Sustained attention deficit in bipolar disorder is not a working memory impairment in disguise. Neuropsy-chologia 2002; 40:1586-1590. This paper provides an interesting neuropsychological argument regarding the specificity of cognitive dysfunction in bipolar disorder and highlights the current uncertainty about the key deficit in bipolar disorder.
19. Baddeley AD, Hitch GJ. Working memory. In: Bower GA, editor. Recent advances in learning and motivation. New York: Academic Press; 1974. pp 647-667.
20. Baddeley AD, Della Sala D. Working memory and executive control. In: Roberts AC, Robbins TW, Weiskrantz L, editors. The prefrontal cortex: executive and cognitive functions. Oxford: Oxford University Press; 1998. pp. 9-21.
21. Miyake A, Friedman NP, Emerson MJ, et al. The unity and diversity of executive functions and their contributions to complex 'frontal lobe' tasks: a latent variable analysis. Cognit Psychol 2000; 41:49-100.
22. Rabbitt P. Introduction: methodologies and models in the study of executive function. In: Rabbitt P, editor. Methodology of frontal and executive function. Sussex: Psychology Press; 1997. pp. 1-38.
23. Cavanagh JTO, van Beck M, Muir W, Blackwood DHR. Case-control study of neurocognitive function in euthymic patients with bipolar disorder: an association with mania. Br J Psychiatry 2002; 180:320-326. This is an interesting paper to read in conjunction with that by Clark et al. [12] for evidence of contrasting neuropsychological deficits in euthymic bipolar patients.
24. MacQueen GM, Young LT, Galway TM, Joffe RT. Backward masking task performance in stable, euthymic out-patients with bipolar disorder. Psychol Med 2001; 31:1269-1277. This is a well conducted study that investigated visual processing in bipolar disorder. The paper also discusses the relationship between cognitive deficits and illness characteristics, and the implications of this association.
25. Harmer CJ, Grayson L, Goodwin GM. Enhanced recognition of disgust in bipolar illness. Biol Psychiatry 2002; 51:298-304. This study addresses emotional processing in bipolar persons during the remitted state.
26. Ferrier IN, Thompson JM. Cognitive impairment in bipolar affective disorder: implications for the bipolar diathesis. Br J Psychiatry 2002; 180:293-295. This editorial integrates the recent evidence for selective deficits in bipolar disorder, the associated neural correlates and possible mechanisms of development. Methodological issues are discussed and ideas for future studies proposed.
27. Altshuler L. Bipolar disorder: are repeated episodes associated with neuroanatomic and cognitive changes? Biol Psychiatry 1993; 33:563-565.
28. Raikowska G. Postmortem studies in mood disorders indicate altered numbers of neurons in glial cells. Biol Psychiatry 2000; 48:766-777.
29. Nasrallah HA. Neurodevelopmental aspects of bipolar affective disorder. Biol Psychiatry 1991; 29:1-2.
30. Sigurdsson E, Fombonne E, Sayal K, Checkley S. Neurodevelopmental antecedents of early-onset bipolar affective disorder. Br J Psychiatry 1999; 174:121-127.
31. Keri S, Kelemen O, Benedek G, Janka Z. Different trait markers for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder: a neurocognitive approach. Psychol Med 2001; 31:915-922. This is one of the few high-risk neuropsychological studies in bipolar disorder. The authors conducted a detailed neuropsychological assessment of a homogeneous sample of first-degree relatives of patients with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
32. McDonough-Ryan P, DelBello M, Shear PK, et al. Academic and cognitive abilities in children of patients with bipolar disorder: a test of the nonverbal learning disability model. J Clin Exp Neuropsychol 2002; 24:280-285. The authors discuss the evidence for right hemisphere dysfunction and executive dysfunction in bipolar disorder based on their analysis of neuropsychological function in children with bipolar parents.
33. Flor-Henry P. Functional hemispheric asymmetry and psychopathology. Integrative Psychiatry 1983; 1:46-52.
34. Hughes JH, Gallagher P, Young AH. Effects of acute tryptophan depletion on cognitive function in euthymic bipolar patients. Eur Neuropsychopharmacol 2002; 12:123-128. One of the only studies to consider the underlying pharmacological basis for persistent cognitive dysfunction in euthymic bipolar patients is presented.
35. Sobczak S, Riedel WJ, Booij I, et al. Cognition following acute tryptophan depletion: difference between first-degree relatives of bipolar disorder patients and matched healthy control volunteers. Psychol Med 2002; 32:503-515. This is an interesting paper that demonstrates impaired performance on selected cognitive tasks following ATD in subjects at high-risk for bipolar disorder.
36. Harrison PJ. The neuropathology of primary mood disorder. Brain 2002; 125:1428-1449. This thorough review of the neuropathological literature provides excellent insight into the implications of cytoarchitectural disturbances in bipolar disorder.
37. Moore PB, Shepherd DJ, Eccleston D, et al. Cerebral white matter lesions in bipolar affective disorder: relationship to outcome. Br J Psychiatry 2001; 178:172-176. The authors of this paper discuss the various aetiologies associated with white matter lesions in different neuroanatomical locations in bipolar disorder.
38. Ongur D, Drevets WC, Price JL. Glial reduction in the subgenual prefrontal cortex in mood disorders. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 1998; 95:13290-13295.
39. Cotter DR, Pariante CM, Everall IP. Glial cell abnormalities in major psychiatric disorders: the evidence and implications. Brain Res Bull 2001; 55:585-595. This informative paper addresses the role of glial cells and the significance of glial cell abnormalities in bipolar disorder.
40. Xing G, Russell S, Hough C, et al. Decreased prefrontal CaMKII alpha mRNA in bipolar illness. NeuroReport 2002; 13:501-505. This paper provides neuropathological evidence to support the proposal of prefrontal cortex dysfunction in bipolar disorder. Specific areas of the prefrontal cortex are examined and discussed separately.
41. Curtis VA, Dixon TA, Morris ET, et al. Differential frontal activation in schizophrenia and bipolar illness during verbal illness. J Affect Disord 2001; 66:111-121. The authors of this paper explore the diagnostic implications of functional neuroimaging abnormalities during the performance of cognitive tasks.
42. Ketter TA, Kimbrell TA, George MS, et al. Effects of mood and subtype on cerebral glucose metabolism in treatment-resistant bipolar disorder. Biol Psychiatry 2001; 49:97-109. The authors of this paper provide an in-depth assessment of state and trait abnormalities of cerebral glucose metabolism in bipolar disorder.
43. Rubinsztein JS, Fletcher PC, Rogers RD, et al. Decision-making in mania: a PET study. Brain 2001; 124:2550-2563.
44. Drevets WC, Price JL, Simpson JR, et al. Subgenual prefrontal cortex abnormalities in mood disorders. Nature 1997; 386:824-827.