Platelet serotonin as a biomarker for depression diagnosis in untreated patients

Abstract

A case-control study was conducted from August 2022 to November 2022. Sixty healthy control subjects were enrolled, most of whom were volunteers from the laboratory in Ibn-Rushed Hospital Training, Baghdad, Iraq, and medical students. Subjects were considered controls if they did not have a personal psychiatric history and were not receiving psychoactive medication. Patients were sixty depressive inpatients, age and gender-matched, with an age range of 25-60 years. The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay technique was used to assess platelet serotonin concentrations. The mean ranks of platelet serotonin in the cases and controls were 30.55 ng/ml and 90.45 ng/ml, respectively. The platelet serotonin in the cases group was significantly lower than that of the control group (P-value=0.001). The mean ranks of platelet count in the cases and control were 49.3 ng/ml and 71.7 ng/ml, respectively. The platelet count in the cases group was significantly lower than that of the control group (P-value=0.001).