Correlation between anxiety-depression symptoms and immune characteristics in inpatients with 2019 novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is widely acknowledged as a severe traumatic event, and depression, anxiety, and psychological distress are common in diagnosed patients. However, the correlations of biological indicators with emotion are rarely reported. The primary objective of this study was to explore the dysfunction of immune-inflammatory characteristics in patients with depression-anxiety symptoms.

We investigated the mental status of inpatients with COVID-19 in Wuhan and compared the differences in cytokines and lymphocytes between patients with and without depression-anxiety symptoms at admission. After two weeks of treatment, we evaluated the mental conditions and measured the cytokines and lymphocytes of the patients with depression and anxiety symptoms and explored the changes and their associations.

Approximately half of the patients with COVID-19 had depression and anxiety symptoms, and the symptoms were related to the ratio of CD4+/CD8+ and the level of CD4⁺T lymphocytes. When compared with patients without depression-anxiety symptoms, CD4⁺T lymphocytes level was significantly higher in COVID-19 patients with depression-anxiety symptoms.

This study provided novel evidence regarding the association between depression and anxiety symptoms and immune characteristics, especially CD4⁺T lymphocyte levels, in COVID-19 patients. We emphasized the importance of paying attention to the dynamic immune process of patients diagnosed with COVID-19 with depression/anxiety.