Posted on 07/19/2022 7:58:47 PM PDT by algore
Low serotonin levels do not cause depression, according to a major review.
Today's landmark findings call into question society's ever-growing reliance on antidepressants like Prozac.
Millions of patients take selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors
We believe this situation has been driven partly by the false belief that depression is due to a chemical imbalance.
'It is high time to inform the public that this belief is not grounded in science.'
One in six British adults and roughly 13 per cent of Americans take antidepressants, figures suggest.
NHS data shows there has been a surge in prescriptions doled out in England, with 8.3million patients taking them in 2021/22, 6 per cent more than the previous year.
The most common are SSRIs such as fluoxetine (Prozac), citalopram (Cipramil) and sertraline (Lustral).
Serotonin helps carry signals in the brain and is thought to have a positive influence on mood, emotion and sleep.
They are preferred to other types of antidepressants because they cause fewer side effects. Yet they can still lead patients taking them to experience anxiety, diarrhoea, dizziness and blurred vision.
Depressed patients can also be hit by crippling withdrawal symptoms when they try to come off the pills.
At the same time, a raft of studies have suggested they don't work any better than a placebo.
The UCL study, published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, analysed 17 previous reviews dating back to 2010 and consisting of dozens of individual trials.
It does not prove SSRIs don't work. However, it does suggest the drugs don't treat depression by fixing abnormally low serotonin levels.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Probably we should just give them puberty blockers and booster shots instead
Covid
Get rid of the d@mn pharmaceuticals. There are some in the population that might need them, but IMHO, they are over prescribed. Sometimes people have a problem that they need help with. How about we start with actual communication instead of drugging everybody?
Low levels of Vitamin D.
“Sometimes people have a problem that they need help with. How about we start with actual communication instead of drugging everybody?”
Better yet, get them off their ass and off the junk food.
Exercise and nutrition will CURE it.
Think bootcamp...
Interesting. Merits more time looking into this on my part.
It explains a LOT.
Do you think everyone who takes SSRIs are fat and eat junk food and just sit on their asses?
LOLOLOLOL.
Here’s my theory:
When you take a chemical to make you feel better...it works.
However, when and if you do NOT take the chemical, the depression, the hopelessness, the despair...RETURNS WITH A VENGENCE, worse than the original malady.
It wants to make up for the limited time when you felt happy.
But that’s just me.
I hope I never feel the need for them and I hope I am wrong about the return of the feeling down for other people.
Combined with lack of exercise and mobility…. Which explains the Vitamin D bcz people are fat and indoors.
Yep, everybody on SSRIs are fat, lazy, and stay indoors. /s
Yes.
Get out into the Sun, and find something productive to really care about and to occupy your mind.
More sunshine?
Not everybody of course. They have their place and some folks need them…. many don’t.
This news comes just in time. I deal with depression a lot. Even though I know the reality of Christ, my emotions and thought patterns are often negative. (What I’m trying to say is that I know based on the promises in God’s Word that my thoughts are not reality) I’ve been considering taking trazodone to see if that would help.
It didn’t help with the chemo nausea and so, I have little expectations of help now.
I will continue on my present course: crippling depression along with deep prayer during those times.
“It does not prove SSRIs don’t work. However, it does suggest the drugs don’t treat depression by fixing abnormally low serotonin levels.”
Take home message.
If the drugs work, they work.
Saying that, if they actually work is debatable.
SSRIs aren’t helpful to many people, and instead cause problems that weren’t there. They are over-prescribed as a panacea. Exercise, eating right, and getting vitamin D help for sure, but there are many who actually have real trauma and abuse in their lives that they need help with. SSRIs don’t address this, and neither do diet, exercise, and sunshine. Some people need to talk about their trauma in order to move past it. I think there are many people who are mis-diagnosed as depressed but are really just tying to figure out how to right the wrongs that have happened. JMHO. I’m not a professional.
History will one day record these decades of calling it a chem imbalance as witchcraft.
I suffered with it for 30 yrs before I started taking meds. The medication is a lifesaver. I tried everything. As for vitiman D, I take that too.
Its so easy to just say exercise by someone who has never suffered from it. Exercise is not a cure all
The prevailing standard of care for clinical depression is medication combined with cognitive behavioral therapy. That will include lifestyle interventions such as improving diet, exercise, coaching on problem solving skills, social skills, etc.
I agree with the cognitive behavioral therapy, but I think there are a lot of doctors who take the easy way out, and just prescribe, prescribe, prescribe. They don’t get to the root of the problem.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.