Escitalopram effects on functional connectivity of major depressive disorder–a systematic review

摘要: Methods: A systematic literature search was performed on the PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science databases, from inception until March 24 th, 2023, using the keywords: escitalopram AND connectivity. The inclusion criteria were as follows: articles published in English language, including adult patients with MDD who underwent fMRI scans before and after treatment with escitalopram, with measured effects and changes of FC related to medication.Results: 4 of 412 articles were included, resulting in a total sample of 117 MDD patients and 143 healthy controls (HCs). Escitalopram was found to increase or decrease baseline abnormal FC after 8 or 12 weeks of treatment in key networks as default mode network (DMN), ventral attention network (VAN), subcortical network (SCN), and in relevant regions like dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), anteromedial prefrontal …