Childhood maltreatment is linked to recurrent depression

People who were badly treated as children are twice as likely to experience recurrent bouts of enduring depression as those who had emotionally secure childhoods, indicates a meta-analysis published online in the American Journal of Psychiatry. And such people are 43% more likely to respond poorly to treatment, it found (doi:10.1176/appi.ajp.2011.11020335).

The results hold true irrespective of sex and the age at which the maltreatment started, said the lead author, Andrea Danese of the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College London, at a press briefing last week.

The findings are based on a combined meta-analysis of 16 epidemiological studies and 10 clinical trials, with 23 544 and 3098 participants, …