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Background MicroRNAs (miRs) have been suggested to be biomarkers to inform the diagnosis of major depressive disorder (MDD). We have previously shown that exosome-derived miR-139-5p had potential in differentiating between patients with MDD and healthy control (HC) subjects. Materials and Methods To validate the potential of exosome-derived miR-139-5p as a biomarker for MDD, here we recruited 30 patients with MDD and 30 HC subjects, and used TaqMan probes to detect serum exosomal miR-139-5p levels. Results The data showed that patients with MDD had significantly increased exosomal miR-139-5p levels when compared with controls. Correlation analysis suggested that sex, age, and body mass index did not significantly affect blood exosomal miR-139-5p levels in the tested subjects. The ROC curve showed that serum-derived miR-139-5p had reasonable performance in discriminating patients with MDD and HC subjects, with a sensitivity of 0.867 and specificity of 0.767, and the AUC was 0.807. Discussion Taken together, these results demonstrated that patients with MDD were accompanied by significantly increased blood exosomal miR-139-5p levels, and exosomal miR-139-5p is a promising biomarker for the diagnosis of MDD.

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This study aims to explore mediating effects of professional quality of life on the relationship between big-five personality traits and job satisfaction in a Chinese healthcare setting. A total of 1620 Chinese healthcare professionals were recruited to participate in a randomised cross-sectional survey. The results suggest that professional quality of life transmitted the effect of personality to job satisfaction. Specifically, compassion satisfaction and burnout mediated the positive effect of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness upon job satisfaction; as well as mediated negative effects of neuroticism upon job satisfaction. Secondary traumatic stress mediated the positive effect of extraversion upon job satisfaction. The paper also discusses the cultural factors contributing to the mediating effects and implications offered by the study at the macro, messo, and micro levels.

Objective Building upon the tripartite model of anxiety and depression, the current study aims to examine mechanisms of comorbidity between anxiety and depression using the ProQOL (Professional Quality of Life; including the constructs of burnout, secondary traumatic stress, and compassion satisfaction) in a sample of Chinese health-care clinicians. Method A randomized cross-sectional survey was distributed to 1620 participants who were recruited from eight state-owned hospitals in a city in southern China between January and May 2017. A total of 1562 questionnaires were returned (a response rate of 96.4%). After the cases with more than 10% missing variables and multivariate outliers being removed, 1423 valid cases remained. Multiple mediator models were used for mediation analysis that was conducted using the PROCESS v3.1 macro for SPSS. Results The indirect effects of anxiety upon depression through burnout (a1 = . 601 (95% confidence interval (CI): .552, .650), p < .001; b1 = .137 (95% CI: .101, .174), p < .001) and compassion satisfaction (a3= −.297 (95% CI: −.352, −.241), p < .001; b3 = −.069 (95% CI: −.100, −.039), p < .001) were significant, while there was no evidence that anxiety influenced depression by changing secondary traumatic stress. The indirect effects of depression upon anxiety through secondary traumatic stress (a2 = . 535 (95% CI: .483, .588), p < .001); b2 = .154 (95% CI: .120, .188), p < .001) were both positive and significant, while there was no evidence that depression influenced anxiety by changing burnout and compassion satisfaction. Conclusions In the current sample, burnout and compassion satisfaction mediated the effect of anxiety upon depression and secondary traumatic stress mediated the effect of depression upon anxiety. The findings of the current study offer support to the tripartite model.