The state of the field regarding the diagnosis and treatment of major depressive disorder (MDD) is discussed. Current challenges and opportunities facing the research and clinical communities are outlined, including appropriate quantitative and qualitative analyses of the heterogeneity of biological, social, and psychiatric factors which may contribute to MDD.

This lesson delves into the opportunities and challenges of telepsychiatry. While novel digital approaches to clinical research and care have the potential to improve and accelerate patient outcomes, researchers and care providers must consider new population factors, such as digital disparity. 

This lesson provides a basic introduction to clinical presentation of schizophrenia, its etiology, and current treatment options.

The INS Emerging Issues Task Force held a virtual panel discussion on the evolving role and increased adoption of digital applications to deliver mental health care. It was held as a session at the annual conference of the Italian Society for Neuroethics.

This talks discusses data sharing in the context of dementia. It explains why data sharing in dementia is important, how data is usually shared in the field and illustrates two examples: the Netherlands Consortium Dementia cohorts and the European Platform for Neurodegenerative Diseases.

The Medical Informatics Platform (MIP) Dementia had been installed in several memory clinics across Europe allowing them to federate their real-world databases. Research open access databases had also been integrated such as ADNI (Alzheimer’s Dementia Neuroimaging Initiative), reaching a cumulative case load of more than 5,000 patients (major cognitive disorder due to Alzheimer’s disease, other major cognitive disorder, minor cognitive disorder, controls). The statistic and machine learning tools implemented in the MIP allowed researchers to conduct easily federated analyses among Italian memory clinics (Redolfi et al. 2020) and also across borders between the French (Lille), the Swiss (Lausanne) and the Italian (Brescia) datasets.

The number of patients with dementia is estimated to increase given the aging population. This will lead to a number of challenges in the future in terms of diagnosis and care for patients with dementia. To meet these needs such as early diagnsosis and development of prognostic biomarkers, large datasets, such as the federated datasets on dementia. The EAN Dementia and cognitive disorders scientific panel can play an important role as coordinator and connecting panel members who wish to participate in e.g. consortia.

This lecture gives an introduction to the types of glial cells, homeostasis (influence of cerebral blood flow and influence on neurons), insulation and protection of axons (myelin sheath; nodes of Ranvier), microglia and reactions of the CNS to injury.