There seems little reason to prescribe anti-depressant medication to any but the most severely depressed patients.
From Irving Kirsch
Perhaps anti-depressants should be best reserved for the very extreme cases and, more importantly, for those who do not respond to alternative forms of interventions.
There seem to be many causes of depression. One cause is profound loss, grief. Economic hardship we know is linked to depression. We don't have a full picture.
The one thing we do know is that the chemical imbalance theory - the theory that people get depressed when they don't have enough serotonin in their brain - we know that that's wrong.
One problem I have with drug companies is that they don't make all their data public.
I do a lot of research on the placebo effect, not just in depression but in irritable bowel syndrome, pain, arthritis of the knee, migraine, asthma.
Psychotherapy works, and some types of therapy have been shown to be much more effective than antidepressants over the long run.
If you're taking an antidepressant, it's working, and you're not experiencing side effects, go on taking it. But if it's not working, or not working well enough, or if you have side effects you don't like, talk to your doctor about an alternative approach.
Depression comes back over time in about 90 percent of people on antidepressants. Studies show that relapses are far less common when people are treated with psychotherapy.
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