Depressed Jane

Choices and Challenges at Virginia Tech will hold a public forum entitled “On Prozac: Debating the New Technologies of Mind,” a day-long series of panels and discussions to be held on Nov. 10 in the Graduate Life Center at Donaldson Brown. This forum is open to the public at no charge. In 1987, a new class of antidepressant medications, the Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) appeared on the market, promising a cleaner, more effective treatment for depression, with greatly reduced side-effects… click link for more info.

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Aetna CEO John Rowe on Wednesday is expected to announce a plan under which the insurer will increase payments to physicians who participate in a depression management program focusing on screening and follow-up consultations, the New York Times reports… click link for more info.

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For patients with seasonal affective disorder (SAD), starting treatment with an antidepressant medication during the fall can reduce the risk of developing depression throughout the fall and winter months, reports a study in the Oct. 15 issue of Biological Psychiatry, official journal of the Society of Biological Psychiatry, published by Elsevier, a world-leading scientific and medical publisher… click link for more info.

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Consumer ads for a class of antidepressants called SSRIs often claim that depression is due to a chemical imbalance in the brain, and that SSRIs correct this imbalance, but these claims are not supported by scientific evidence, say researchers in PLoS Medicine. Although scientists in the 1960s suggested that depression may be linked to low brain levels of the chemical serotonin (the so-called “serotonin hypothesis”), contemporary research has failed to confirm the hypothesis, they say… click link for more info.

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Dopamine is one of the brain’s 'feel good’ chemicals. Alcohol boosts levels of dopamine, hence the popularity of social drinking. No surprise then, that for the treatment of depression, interest is growing in dopamine as a therapeutic target - at least according to presentations at 'Beyond Serotonin - The Science of Neurotransmitters’ a workshop held at the recent European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) congress held in Amsterdam… click link for more info.

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When the U.S. Food and Drug Administration declared in 2004 that certain antidepressants are linked to an increased risk of suicide in adolescents, there was surprisingly little data about how depression was being treated in young patients. Now new research from the Stanford University School of Medicine provides critical documentation of the potential misuse of these medications in the years leading up to the FDA’s decision to issue the so-called “black-box” warnings… click link for more info.

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Determining when treatment of a depressed patient can safely be discontinued is important but difficult for clinicians; until now, no tests have been available that are simple to administer in a doctor’s office. Roger McIntyre and colleagues developed a brief 7-item questionnaire to determine if a patient with depression has recovered, and have now evaluated it for use in primary care… click link for more info.

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How useful is exercise for people with severe depression, anxiety, or chronic mental illness? According to the December issue of the Harvard Mental Health Letter, hundreds of studies show that it can help-but there are qualifications. The Harvard Mental Health Letter reports that possible explanations for the mood-enhancing effect of exercise include: - enhanced body image- social support from exercise groups- distraction from everyday worries- heightened self-confidence from meeting a goal- altered circulation of the neurotransmitters serotonin, norepinephrine, and the endorphins… click link for more info.

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An estimated 17 million adults ages 18 and older (8.0 percent) reported having experienced at least one major depressive episode during the past year, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) reported today. Around two thirds of them reported receiving treatment for that depression in the past year, according to the new report, "Depression among Adults"… click link for more info.

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A team care model for treating depression in adults aged 60 years and older is more cost-effective than standard treatment options, according to a study published by researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine, the University of Washington and 6 other institutions. The study appears in the Dec… click link for more info.

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