Depression, Infectious Pathogens, and subclinical CAD

描述（由申请人提供）： 候选人：候选人是医学助理教授，拥有博士学位。在流行病学上。他在研究设计、数据分析和手稿撰写方面具有非常强的技能。他长期以来一直对抑郁症如何影响心血管健康感兴趣，并且是最近发表在《内科医学档案》上的一项关于抑郁症和心力衰竭事件的研究的主要作者。候选人的近期职业目标有两个方面：（1）进行一项研究，研究传染性病原体是否介导抑郁症和冠状动脉疾病（CAD）之间的联系，以及（2）提高他的研究技能，以培养他未来进行抑郁症和CAD研究的能力。他的长期职业目标是成为一名独立的研究者，进行以患者为导向的抑郁症和心血管疾病研究。 研究职业发展计划：候选人打算从事一些职业发展活动。最重要的两项活动如下：（1）他将接受如何使用旨在测量抑郁症的仪器的培训。这些工具将包括DSM-IV（SCID）的结构化临床访谈以及汉密尔顿抑郁量表（HAMD）。在接受足够的培训后，候选人将在其研究中为参与者管理这些仪器。（2）候选人将获得人格和心理学领域的进一步知识，并将发展统计遗传学领域的技能。这将通过参加研讨会，讲习班和课程来实现。 研究项目：候选人研究项目的具体目标是检查抑郁症与亚临床CAD之间的关联是否由传染性病原体介导。他的项目将是NHLBI资助的现有研究（“双胞胎心脏研究”）的子研究。他的项目将以80对男性双胞胎为样本。将通过SCID、HAMD和Beck抑郁量表评估抑郁症。将通过ELISA方法评估各种感染性病原体抗体的血清阳性。CAD的亚临床指标包括冠状动脉血流储备（通过PET评估）、颈动脉内膜中层厚度（通过超声评估）和肱动脉血流介导的扩张（通过超声评估）。随机效应回归方法将用于确定抑郁症是否与感染性病原体暴露相关，以及这种相关性是否解释了抑郁症与亚临床CAD之间的联系。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Candidate: The candidate is an Assistant Professor of Medicine with a Ph.D. in epidemiology. He has exceptionally strong skills in the areas of study design, data analysis, and manuscript writing. He has had a longstanding interest in how depression affects cardiovascular health, and was lead author of a recent study of depression and incident heart failure that was published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. The candidate's immediate career goals are twofold: (1)Conduct a study which examines whether infectious pathogens mediate the link between depression and coronary artery disease (CAD), and (2)Enhance his research skills in ways that will foster his ability conduct future studies of depression and CAD. His long term career goal is to become an independent investigator conducting patient-oriented studies of depression and cardiovascular disease. Research Career Development Plan: The candidate intends to pursue a number of career development activities. The two most important activities will be as follows: (1)He will receive training in how to administer instruments designed to measure depression. These instruments will include the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (SCID) as well as the Hamilton Depression Scale (HAMD). After receiving sufficient training, the candidate will administer these instruments to participants in his study. (2)The candidate will acquire further knowledge in the area of personality and psychology and will develop skills in the area of statistical genetics. This will be accomplished by attending seminars, workshops, and classes. Research Project: The specific aim of the candidate's research project is to examine whether the association between depression and subclinical CAD is mediated by infectious pathogens. His project will be a substudy of an existing NHLBI-funded investigation ("The Twins Heart Study"). His project will be based on a sample of 80 male-male twin pairs. Depression will be assessed by the SCID, HAMD, and the Beck Depression Inventory. Seropositivity to antibodies of a variety of infectious pathogens will be assessing by ELISA methods. Subclinical measures of CAD will include coronary flow reserve (assessed by PET), carotid intima-media thickness (assessed by ultrasound), and flow-mediated dilation of the brachial artery (assessed by ultrasound). Random effects regression methods will be used to determine if depression is associated with infectious pathogen exposure and whether such an association explains the link between depression and subclinical CAD.