The Effects of Fluoxetine and Agomelatine on Neurocognitive Functions and Sleep in Patients with Major Depressive Disorder.

Background: We aimed to evaluate the effects of 6 weeks of agomelatine versus fluoxetine treatment on cognition and sleep.

Methods: Agomelatine 25 mg/day and fluoxetine 20 mg/day were administered to major depressive disorder (MDD) patients. Assessments were conducted before the treatment and at the sixth week of treatment via psychometric measures and comprehensive neurocognitive assessments of various functions, including executive skills, attention, memory, verbal fluency, and speed of processing.

Results: They both improved the evaluated neurocognitive test scores ( < .05), except for the scores of the Digit Span Test ( > .05), but only fluoxetine significantly improved the scores of the Controlled Oral Word Association Test ( = .018). Only in relation to the subjective sleep quality part of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index ( = .035) and the Trail Making Test-B (TMT-B) ( = .046) was there an important difference between the study groups, and agomelatine showed better effects than fluoxetine in these measures.

Conclusion: Both drugs improved the neurocognitive functioning in the participants. However, the better effect of agomelatine in improving the TMT-B scores suggests that it is a suitable option for MDD patients with noticeable executive disturbances.