The early-onset dysthymics showed a higher number of persons who had never married, who presented a more traumatic and frustrating childhood background, and who had a higher rate of DST non-suppressors and blunted TSH responses after TRH administration during the period of their double depression.
The results of the TRH test and the DST point to similar endocrinological patterns in alcoholics as in depressive patients and thus support the hypothesis of a link between alcoholism and depression.
Depression and suboptimal weight were unrelated and thus appear to contribute independently to the high rate of DST abnormalities commonly seen in bulimia.
The data support the view that the DST has limited utility as a biologic marker of depression, but that an analysis of physical complaints using the PCL may be useful in the differential diagnosis of depression in some cultures.