Be wary of anxiety and depression! They could be signs of brain tumour

Zee Media Bureau

London: Most often, we ignore psychiatric symptoms such as depression, mania, hallucinations and anxiety disorders. But according to a doctor who treated a woman thought to have treatment-resistant depression, those signs could actually point towards brain tumour .

The 54-year-old woman had been depressed for six months, but treatment with the antidepressant fluoxetine and the anti-anxiety medication bromazepam was discontinued after five months because these were not found to be effective. 

The patient's symptoms included apathy, difficulties with making decisions and initiating action, a lack of energy, sleep disorders, and concentration and attention problems. She also had suicidal thoughts, admitted self-accusation due to ineffectiveness in her job, and lost interest in her usual past times.

A neurological examination was normal. However, a brain CT scan and MRI revealed meningiomatosis with a giant meningioma -- the most common primary benign brain tumour -- in her left frontal lobe.Thankfully, the patient underwent emergency surgery, and made a recovery. The depressive symptoms disappeared within one month.

The doctors say that certain patients should have a brain scan to identify or exclude the possibility of a tumour, but note that "it seems unrealistic to prescribe brain imaging in every patient with a depressive syndrome" because this mental disorder is common while brain tumours are "remarkably rare" in patients with depression.