Trial reportNeuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology2015
Mineralocorticoid receptor stimulation improves cognitive function and decreases cortisol secretion in depressed patients and healthy individuals.
Trial report in Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT03062150 (Effects of Mineralocorticoid Receptor Stimulation on Cognitive Bias and Social Cognition in Patients With Major Depression and Healthy Controls), which is not on this map. Cited by 40 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Effects of Mineralocorticoid Receptor Stimulation on Cognitive Bias and Social Cognition in Patients With Major Depression and Healthy Controls: What's the Role of NMDA Receptors?
Who cites it
40 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 91 citations in OpenAlex.
- Corticosteroids and Cognition: A Meta-Analysis.Neuropsychology review · 2019Pooled it
- Cortisol effects on brain functional connectivity during emotion processing in women with depression.Journal of affective disorders · 2021Trial
- Steroid hormone secretion after stimulation of mineralocorticoid and NMDA receptors and cardiovascular risk in patients with depression.Translational psychiatry · 2020Trial
- Effects of mineralocorticoid receptor blockade on empathy in patients with major depressive disorder.Cognitive, affective & behavioral neuroscience · 2016Trial
- Review
- Gut Modulators Alter BDNF/Cortisol Axis in Severe Obesity: Additional Secondary Outcomes from a Triple-Blind Randomized Trial.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Gingerol-Enriched Ginger Extract Effects on Anxiety-like Behavior in a Neuropathic Pain Model via Colonic Microbiome-Neuroimmune Modulation.Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Mechanisms Underlying Treatment-Resistant Depression: Exploring Sex-Based Biological Differences.Journal of neurochemistry · 2025Review
- Large-scale plasma proteomics uncovers novel targets linking ambient air pollution and depression.Molecular psychiatry · 2025Article
- Novel Insights into Dietary Bioactive Compounds and Major Depressive Disorders: Evidence from Animal Studies and Future Perspectives.The Journal of nutrition · 2025Review
- Cross-sectional association between plasma aldosterone concentration and cognitive performance by mini-mental state examination in community dwellers.Frontiers in nutrition · 2025Article
- The Hypothalamus-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis and Social Cognition in Borderline Personality Disorder.Current neuropharmacology · 2024Review
- Glucocorticoids and cognitive function: a walkthrough in endogenous and exogenous alterations.Journal of endocrinological investigation · 2023Review
- Pharmacological targeting of cognitive impairment in depression: recent developments and challenges in human clinical research.Translational psychiatry · 2022Review
- Spironolactone as a potential new pharmacotherapy for alcohol use disorder: convergent evidence from rodent and human studies.Molecular psychiatry · 2022Article
- Brain mineralocorticoid receptor in health and disease: From molecular signalling to cognitive and emotional function.British journal of pharmacology · 2022Article
- Mineralocorticoid receptor status in the human brain after dexamethasone treatment: a single case study.Endocrine connections · 2022Article
- Novel Pharmacological Approaches to the Treatment of Depression.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
- Article
- Nuclear receptors modulate inflammasomes in the pathophysiology and treatment of major depressive disorder.World journal of psychiatry · 2021Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
11 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Memory and executive function are often impaired in patients with major depression, while cortisol secretion is increased. Mineralocorticoid receptors (MR) are abundantly expressed in the hippocampus and in the prefrontal cortex, brain areas critical for memory, executive function, and cortisol inhibition. Here, we investigated whether MR stimulation with fludrocortisone (1) improves memory and executive function and (2) decreases cortisol secretion in depressed patients and healthy individuals. Twenty-four depressed patients without medication and 24 age-, sex-, and education-matched healthy participants received fludrocortisone (0.4 mg) or placebo in a randomized, double-blind, within-subject cross-over design. We measured verbal memory, visuospatial memory, executive function, psychomotor speed, and salivary cortisol secretion during cognitive testing between 1400 and 1700 hours. For verbal memory and executive function, we found better performance after fludrocortisone compared with placebo across groups. No treatment effect on other cognitive domains emerged. Depressed patients performed worse than healthy individuals in psychomotor speed and executive function. No group effect or group × treatment interaction emerged on other cognitive domains. Fludrocortisone decreased cortisol secretion across groups and there was a significant correlation between cortisol inhibition and verbal memory performance. Our data suggest a crucial role of MR in verbal memory and executive function and demonstrate the possibility to improve cognition in depressed patients and healthy individuals through MR stimulation.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.