A Brown University study of European households finds an association between depression and the presence of mold in the home. The risk for depression increased by about 40 percent among people who lived in moldy homes, said lead research author Edmund D. Shenassa. It is as yet unclear what the relationship between the two is – does mold actually cause depression, or are depressed people more likely to not clean their homes and allow mold to grow? The U.S. government has not established general guidelines for acceptable levels of residential mold. And no study has conclusively linked mold exposure to mental health problems.
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Tags: depression, exposure, mold, moldy
Dr. Steven Chang, the author of DailyDose, is a staff physician with Kosmix RightHealth. Dr. Chang practices Family Medicine at the University of California Davis Medical Center, where his medical interests include both pediatric and geriatric care, public health, gay and lesbian health, and sleep medicine. Dr. Chang trained at the Stanford University affiliated O'Connor Hospital, and was a research fellow at the National Institute of Health. He holds an M.D. from McGill University and a BA in Public Health from Johns Hopkins University.
October 29th, 2008 at 8:00 am
Who does one call to have a room checked for mold and do the ‘kits’ that tehy sell at hardware stores work??
October 30th, 2008 at 9:40 am
I have been suffering from depression for over 6 years, please note I am a very clean person. I believe the damp musty smell with the hard enviroment will cause depression. I live in an unit in Huntington Beach, Ca which has poor ventilation and bad lighting so my depression has been more apparent lately in fact I’m under doctors care. I lived in an apartment I was full of mold which was hidden very well, it was the same apartment my mother died in with breast cancer. My mother was cleaner than I am, I believe mold can be connected since most of us live on property that we don’t own. My landlord insist there’s no mold but I am now on two inhalers and my mental health medication have increased.