January 12th, 2010

Did you know that recent research shows that medication may only be beneficial for patients with severe depression?

Reports National Public Radio:

Millions of Americans swallow antidepressants each day. Many are people who struggle with terrible, debilitating depressions, but some are people who have only mild or moderate symptoms. They are often prescribed antidepressants anyway with the expectation that the drugs will help them feel better.

Although antidepressants have been around for decades, relatively few studies have focused directly on how the pills affect people with milder symptoms. A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association this week looked directly at this group and concluded that antidepressant medications don’t seem to work well for people who struggle with mild or moderate symptoms.

A Peculiar Truth About Research Design

Since Prozac was introduced to the American public in 1987, there’s been a huge amount of research on antidepressants. Small armies of patients have offered themselves up for testing and gone through a complex screening process.

One part of that process is a standardized test that measures a patient’s level of depression, says Robert DeRubeis, a psychological researcher at the University of Pennsylvania.

“The interviewer asks a series of questions and the patient responds to those questions, and on each of those items the interviewer assigns a rating of zero — if it’s not present — up to the maximum number of 4,” says DeRubeis.

According to the test, any score over 19 means that the patient is severely depressed, and DeRubeis says that in most cases, the people who run antidepressant trials won’t accept you unless you’re actually higher than 20.

Find out more.