Posted by europerep on December 5, 2010, at 16:12:33
In reply to Do antidepressants induce chronicity?, posted by AlexanderfromDenmark on December 4, 2010, at 4:58:28
First of all, I don't think one can have it both ways. Either antidepressants are effective in treating depression, thereby possibly prolonging the illness - or they aren't effective, but how would they then prolong the illness? I mean, it would be a possible, but complicated argument to make that antidepressants are actually ineffective in treating depression, *but* their action induces chronicity. It doesn't really make sense to me...
Then, this statement (from the article, without any backup) seems possibly questionable to me:
"Prior to the widespread use of antidepressants, depressed patients regularly got well, and many never suffered a second bout of major depression."
Also, if more people are depressed for longer periods of time now, one would think that suicide rates should go up, no? Maybe that's compensated by better preventive measures and such, but... I don't know.. I'm not really convinced.
poster:europerep
thread:972394
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20101203/msgs/972614.html