Only those who have experienced it know how harmful depression is. No one is immune. There is a one in four chance that you will experience depression at some point in your life. Getting it is bad enough, but the stigma can make you feel worse. This is the truth about depression.
People have been battling chronic depression for decades. It is remarkable that thousands of people suffer from depression and yet so many feel the need to hide it. Why? Because of the shame. People with depression are seen as weak. Some don’t even think it exists. Stephen Nolan wants to find out the truth about depression.
For those who cannot see depression as a disease, it is very important to reveal their true inner thoughts. Studying the brain through imaging is a relatively new field of science. It has only been studied in the last 15 years or so. Nolan has joined the University of Manchester, one of the UK’s leading centers for brain imaging.
The part of the brain responsible for memory and emotions is the hippocampus. This is where depression comes in. Interestingly, the hippocampus of people with depression behaved differently than those of normal people. Professor Ian Anderson is leading the research.
But there’s quite a bit of research showing that people who are depressed not only have changes in the way their brains work, but actually have changes in the structure of their brains as well. When Anderson examined the hippocampus, he found a significant reduction in large amounts of gray matter in depressed patients. That’s down about 25%, which is really a very significant and striking change.
