in hope the tide will grant me stay / from the ghost that never wanes

[saveyoursanity]

Why the recent Newsweek article about antidepressants not working is full of shit and enraged me:

Therese Brochard, author of Beyond Blue, A Depression Memoir, writes: Newsweek: Do Antidepressants Work? For Many People, YES!
Best quote: "For folks like me, though, who are/were hanging on to life by a very thin and fraying thread, antidepressants

Comments

[filmstar]

I used to love Newsweek and now I don't even read it anymore. They should change the name to Bunchofcrapeditorialsweek.

[ilaniel]

SING IT!

[freckles42]

Pretty much my thoughts. *angry face*

[freckles42]

Good point. It's really sad that Newsweek has become crap. I do remember when it was a pretty decent magazine - of course, that was a good 15+ years ago.

[kyidyl]

Well, it's a statistic. You can say pretty much anything you want with a statistic.

I'd say, it's probably correct though...but I look at it as the reason being that antidepressants are chemicals, and meant to fix chemical imbalances. If an antidepressant is taken by someone who doesn't have a physical problem -- a chemical imbalance -- then it seems like a placebo would be just as effective. I'm not implying that no depression is caused by an actual chemical problem in the brain; obviously, that would be silly to say. More that probably too many people expect a mental issue to have a chemical solution and therefore the placebo effect works on them, skewing the results of studies as to the effectiveness of the drugs.

[saveyoursanity]

Oh no, I completely agree. In fact, if you look at the data, that's exactly what it suggests. People with severe depression do MUCH better on an antidepressant than placebo-showing the "chemical imbalance" really does exist, at least for people with severe depression. People with mild to moderate depression? Eh, not so much. Anyway. Yes. "Lies, damn lies, and statistics." ~ Benjamin Disraeli

[kyidyl]

Yeah, I dunno...it's a hard thing to figure out, because it's not exactly something that can be tested for and the brain is so incredibly complex and not understood as well as it could be. I think if the chemical imbalance thing is true and real, then it wouldn't necessarily just apply to severe depression, there could be things incrementally wrong. Like, severity levels of imbalance.

Either way, the article as a whole raises a question that's interesting to think about. If a person with depression was on antidepressants had a way to *know* 100% that their problem wasn't chemically induced...could they be sure that it was the drugs that helped, or was it the placebo effect? How can anyone using them be *sure* they aren't getting better because of it. Obviously, they can't, and it's just something interesting to think about (because I <3 weird questions like this). :)

[merope3]

sigh...I'm in a snarky mood tonight, so I'll just point out that I'd take the critics of the Newsweek article more seriously if they didn't have drug company ads all over their sites (Cymbalta, Abilify, Seroquel...). Why bite the hand that feeds you?

I hate Newsweek almost as much as I hate Time; both do nothing other than dumb down complex issues. However, the evidence supporting the efficacy of antidepressants in anyone other than the most severely depressed patients is not fabulous and gets worse the longer and deeper you look. No one is particularly happy about this, but that's the way it is.

I am a great believer in "if it works for you, it works." Does it matter if it's placebo?

[saveyoursanity]

You raise a good point-and one I didn't realize, since I have ad-blocking software.

Does it matter if it's placebo... when it really comes down to it, I suppose not. Except that I worry that articles like this will encourage people to go off their medication or never start taking it in the first place, and I'm a strong pro-medication advocate. Then again, I am in the 13% of adults that antidepressants DO work strongly for, so I suppose I'm just as biased as anyone else.

Thanks, hun, for making me think about another side of the issue.

[merope3]

Most of these authors are missing a serious implication of this research into the placebo effect of antidepressants