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American Morning

House Call: Study Shows Testosterone Low In 41 Percent Of Depressed Men

Aired January 08, 2003 - 07:52   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: It's time to make a "House Call" this morning with a man that knows an awful lot about health, our medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Good morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula. A couple of important health stories out there today.

First, a story that may affect the 6.4 million men who suffer from depression in this country. There's a study in the latest issue of the "Journal of Psychiatry" that offers new hope to those who aren't responding well to anti-depressants. A small study conducted by Massachusetts researchers found that men who received testosterone replacement gel along with the anti-depressant showed significant improvement in mood, sleep, appetite, as well as fewer feelings of guilt and anxiety.

Now, researchers emphasize that these findings are pretty early and larger studies need to be conducted before a definitive link between depression and testosterone can be made. But it does look pretty promising.

On another note, Paula, as many as 29 percent of American children sleepwalk or have sleep terrors. And now, there may be new hope for parents and children affected by these sleep problems. A study in the "Journal of Pediatrics" found that children who experience sleepwalking or sleep terrors also have sleep-related breathing abnormalities and/or restless leg syndrome. That's a condition that's marked by an urge to move the legs, especially during sleep.

Now, children with sleep disorder breathing were treated by removing their tonsils or adenoids, and those with RLS, restless leg syndrome, were treated with medication. And those situations of treatment cured all of the children of those recurring sleep disturbances. So, it's kind of promising there as well.

And, Paula, next hour, I want to talk a little bit about the flu. We've talked a lot about anthrax and smallpox and even ricin lately, but the flu, the numbers may be almost twice as bad as we thought they had been. I've got those numbers for you next hour -- Paula.

ZAHN: Coming back to sleep terrors, though, that is the most frightening thing to encounter as a parent. You know, when my children has them, they don't recognize you, it's hard to find out what their level of consciousness is period. It's really scary.

GUPTA: Right, and people have been trying to figure out what caused it for a long time, and it might be something as simple as a breathing disorder. If you can fix that, you can maybe fix the sleeping problem as well.

ZAHN: All right, Dr., thanks. See you in the next hour.

GUPTA: Good seeing you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.




Depressed Men>


Aired January 8, 2003 - 07:52   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: It's time to make a "House Call" this morning with a man that knows an awful lot about health, our medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Good morning.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula. A couple of important health stories out there today.

First, a story that may affect the 6.4 million men who suffer from depression in this country. There's a study in the latest issue of the "Journal of Psychiatry" that offers new hope to those who aren't responding well to anti-depressants. A small study conducted by Massachusetts researchers found that men who received testosterone replacement gel along with the anti-depressant showed significant improvement in mood, sleep, appetite, as well as fewer feelings of guilt and anxiety.

Now, researchers emphasize that these findings are pretty early and larger studies need to be conducted before a definitive link between depression and testosterone can be made. But it does look pretty promising.

On another note, Paula, as many as 29 percent of American children sleepwalk or have sleep terrors. And now, there may be new hope for parents and children affected by these sleep problems. A study in the "Journal of Pediatrics" found that children who experience sleepwalking or sleep terrors also have sleep-related breathing abnormalities and/or restless leg syndrome. That's a condition that's marked by an urge to move the legs, especially during sleep.

Now, children with sleep disorder breathing were treated by removing their tonsils or adenoids, and those with RLS, restless leg syndrome, were treated with medication. And those situations of treatment cured all of the children of those recurring sleep disturbances. So, it's kind of promising there as well.

And, Paula, next hour, I want to talk a little bit about the flu. We've talked a lot about anthrax and smallpox and even ricin lately, but the flu, the numbers may be almost twice as bad as we thought they had been. I've got those numbers for you next hour -- Paula.

ZAHN: Coming back to sleep terrors, though, that is the most frightening thing to encounter as a parent. You know, when my children has them, they don't recognize you, it's hard to find out what their level of consciousness is period. It's really scary.

GUPTA: Right, and people have been trying to figure out what caused it for a long time, and it might be something as simple as a breathing disorder. If you can fix that, you can maybe fix the sleeping problem as well.

ZAHN: All right, Dr., thanks. See you in the next hour.

GUPTA: Good seeing you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.




Depressed Men>