New findings presented at the 2025 ECNP Congress suggest the risks of conditions such as anxiety, chronic pain, asthma, certain cancers and cardiometabolic disease may differ by depression subtype. In an analysis of more than 5,700 adults from the Netherlands Epidemiology of Obesity Study, researchers followed participants for seven years; none had diabetes or cardiovascular disease at enrollment.
Participants were grouped by symptom profiles. An atypical/energy-related profile, marked by fatigue, increased sleep, increased appetite and weight gain, was associated with a 2.7-fold higher risk of type 2 diabetes compared with people without depressive symptoms. A melancholic profile, characterized by decreased appetite, morning-worse mood, weight loss and guilt, was linked to a 1.5-fold higher risk of cardiovascular disease, but not diabetes.
“Depression’s impact goes beyond mental health; it can influence the development and worsening of physical illnesses,” said co–lead author Yuri Milaneschi, PhD, associate professor of psychiatry and epidemiology at Amsterdam UMC, in an interview with Medical News Today. “People who showed [the atypical] symptom profile at baseline had nearly a threefold higher risk of developing diabetes over the next seven years,” he said, adding that the melancholic profile tracked more with cardiovascular risk.
The study has not yet been published in a peer-reviewed journal. Milaneschi said lifestyle factors and some medications may play roles, but likely do not fully explain the associations. Next steps include confirming the results in larger samples of patients with diagnosed depressive disorders and probing biological pathways to guide targeted treatments.
About 332 million people worldwide live with depression, according to the World Health Organization.
