depression, page-20

Hi Alan,

Click on Depression Forums which is a public forum that may help provide some more answers to your questions - It provides both professional advice from psychiatrists, and a public forum for people like yourself to share your own opinions and thoughts etc...

Hi Peace,

I'm not sure if treating social anxiety with SSRI's like Zoloft is a "relatively uncommon scenario' these days, as I believe it may now be the standard of care (prescription), and yours is not the first case I have heard of where an SSRI for social anxiety has delivered a successful outcome.

In terms of other mood disorders like depression however, most of us have been led to believe it is the result of a chemical imbalance in the brain, which antidepressants are reportedly designed to correct, however for all who have swallowed this ploy there is still not one shread of scientific evidence to back it up.

"There is no evidence that there is anything wrong in the serotonergic system of depressed patients." - National Institute of Mental Health

"The serotonin theory is simply not based on any scientific statement, because if you take a drug that blocks the normal reuptake of serotonin, you end up with the very physiological problem the drug is designed to treat - low serotonin levels. Which, ironically, is the state hypothesized to bring on depression in the first place."

My former partner is currently prescribed 50mg of pristiq and 25mg of seroquel to be taken in the evenings - I believe she was most recently diagnosed with having PTSD, although over the years seeing some of the country's best she has never received the same diagnosis twice - In her own opinion this concoction has been working well to combat the 'dark' experiences, however imo it has also been successful in clouding her ability to feel any real emotion such as love, hence the reference to "former" partner - We have been through this same scenario with other antidepressant drugs in the past, but to date I would have to say that pristiq is the most successful in terms of destroying relationships - This Marriages destroyed by SSRI's/SNRIs blog which is specifically related to the parent drug of Pristiq, Effexor has already received over 8,000 responses from others who all share a similar story, yet the pharmaceutical companies refuse to acknowledge this very serious side effect - Quite soul destroying, indeed.

What's next...?

Perhaps bereavement will be diagnosed as a "mental illness" or "chemical imbalance" in the brain, and deemed "treatable" with antidepressants - this would be a great marketing ploy to get nearly every person in the world hooked...

27 December 2012
Antidepressants to treat grief? Psychiatry panelists with ties to drug industry say yes

It was a simple experiment in healing the bereaved: Twenty-two patients who had recently lost a spouse were given a widely used antidepressant.

The drug, marketed as Wellbutrin, improved “major depressive symptoms occurring shortly after the loss of a loved one,” the report in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry concluded.

When, though, should the bereaved be medicated? For years, the official handbook of psychiatry, issued by the American Psychiatric Association, advised against diagnosing major depression when the distress is “better accounted for by bereavement.” Such grief, experts said, was better left to nature.

But that may be changing.

In what some prominent critics have called a bonanza for the drug companies, the American Psychiatric Association this month voted to drop the old warning against diagnosing depression in the bereaved, opening the way for more of them to be diagnosed with major depression — and thus, treated with antidepressants.

The change in the handbook, which could have significant financial implications for the $10 billion U.S. antidepressant market, was developed in large part by people affiliated with the pharmaceutical industry, an examination of financial disclosures shows.

The association itself depends in part on industry funding, and the majority of experts on the committee that drafted the new diagnostic guideline have either received research grants from the drug companies, held stock in them, or served them as speakers or consultants.

Drug companies have shown an interest in treating patients who have recently lost a loved one, having sponsored and published the results of at least three trials in which the bereaved were treated with antidepressants, including the Wellbutrin study.

The financial ties between the creators of the APA handbook and the industry far exceed limits recommended in 2009 by the Institute of Medicine, a branch of the National Academy of Sciences.

The IOM limits reflect the fear that patient health could be compromised when diagnostic and treatment guidelines, which are widely used by doctors, are written largely by industry-hired experts and issued by medical societies that depend on industry funding.

While no evidence has come to light showing that committee members broadened the diagnosis to aid the drug companies, the process of developing the handbook was fraught with financial links to the industry:

- Eight of 11 members of the APA committee that spearheaded the change reported financial connections to pharmaceutical companies — either receiving speaking fees, consultant pay, research grants or holding stock, according to the disclosures filed with the association. Six of the 11 panelists reported financial ties during the time that the committee met, and two more reported financial ties in the five years leading up to the committee assignment, according to APA records.

- A key adviser to the committee — he wrote the scientific justification for the change — was the lead author of the 2001 study on Wellbutrin, sponsored by GlaxoWellcome, showing that its antidepressant Wellbutrin could be used to treat bereavement.

- In 2010, another APA panel developed guidelines on how to treat patients once they have been diagnosed with major depression, including advice on medication. Six of the seven panelists had received consultant pay, lecture fees or research support from pharmaceutical companies, according to their disclosures. The association also appointed an oversight panel that declared that the recommendations had been free of bias, but most of the members of the “independent review panel” had previous financial ties to the industry... - Full Article

Hi pintohoo,

It may indeed be quite difficult to establish the difference between a "completely amateur opinion' and a "completely" professional one when there was once a time when "professional opinion" convinced a world that bleeding patients with knives or leeches, or the removal of organs such as the tonsils or spleen was the answer to curing depression - 20 years from now one may suspect that the chemical imbalance theory will go down in history as the most crazy of all "professional" opinions.

By my own admission I am a self-opinionated person, but have no intention of offending good people like yourself and GP's around the world who dedicate their whole lives to caring for people. I have many friends serving within the medical fraternity, and pharmaceutical industry of whom I consider all to be very decent people, and I often put my foot in my mouth when discussing these topics, however it's difficult to deny that there is an underlying evil at work within the pharmaceutical drug industry driven solely by power and greed.