Maintenance treatment of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) for treatment-resistant depression patients responding to acute TMS treatment

Abstract

A growing body of studies has demonstrated that acute transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) therapy for treatment-resistant major depressive disorder (MDD) has achieved significant antidepressant effects and can alleviate other related symptoms. However, MDD has a high relapse rate, and patients with depressive symptoms can relapse weeks or months after acute TMS treatment. The lack of necessary TMS maintenance protocols after completing acute TMS treatment with full remission might be one of the reasons for the high relapse rates in MDD patients. Thus, investigating post-TMS treatment maintenance guidelines is important for decreasing relapse in treatment-resistant depression patients who had initially responded to acute TMS therapy. Therefore, we recommend a scientific approach to decrease relapse in treatment-resistant depression patients who had initially responded to acute TMS treatment.

Keywords: Transcranial magnetic stimulation; acute; depression; maintenance; major depressive disorder; therapy; treatment-resistant.

Figure 1

A scientific regimen of maintenance TMS treatment for treatment-resistant MDD patients who had initially responded to acute TMS treatment. In the first month of phase 1 (acute phase), all participants were treated with TMS. During maintenance rTMS treatment (maintenance phase), the regularity of rTMS sessions was gradually reduced as follows: three sessions per week for two weeks, followed by two sessions per week for the next two weeks, followed by one session per week for two months, followed by one session every two weeks for eight months. Data in the figure was collected from the reference [17].