Depressive symptoms in the congenital long QT syndrome

Background. A proportion of patients with congenital long QT syndrome (LQTS) experience potentially life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias.

Aim. To examine whether depressive symptoms are related to arrhythmic events among symptomatic and asymptomatic LQTS patients, and syncope events among their relatives not carrying the family's LQTS-causing mutation.

Methods. The participants were 569 molecularly defined LQTS mutation carriers and 622 non-carrier relatives from the Finnish LQTS registry. Depressive symptoms were self-rated with a revised version of the Beck Depression Inventory.

Results. LQTS patients with arrhythmic events scored higher on depressive symptoms than those without (P=0.011) or the control group (P=0.005). In addition, in the binary logistic regression analysis including symptomatic and asymptomatic LQTS mutation carriers, depressive symptoms showed an age- and sex-adjusted association of odds ratio (OR) 1.40 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.12–1.74) with symptomatic status of LQTS. In similar analysis including non-carriers of the LQTS mutation, there was no association between depressive symptoms and history of syncope events OR 1.23 (95% CI 0.99–1.53).

Conclusion. Our results from this relatively large genotyped LQTS patient cohort indicate that depressive symptoms are associated with arrhythmic events in LQTS patients. Whether depressive symptoms are causally related to arrhythmias in LQTS remains uncertain.