Individualized Mapping of the Subgenual Cingulate in Individual Unipolar Depressed Patients Using fMRI

Leslie Baxter¹, Gary Grove², Ryan Smith¹, Perri Handley¹, Michael Purcell¹, Francisco Ponce³, Robert Spetzler³

Deep Brain Stimulation is a new intervention for treating severe depression; however, response rates may be improved with fMRI if the region in the dysfunctional subgenual cingulate is better targeted. We developed a novel fMRI sadness induction paradigm that collects standardized blocks of data within a flexible-block design. Specifically, when subjects attain the targeted emotional state (sad or neutral), they trigger a standardized 30 block through a button press. Only those blocks are analyzed in the post-processing steps. Our preliminary data show that depressed patients can perform this task and generally show greater subgenual responsivity compared to controls.