Bitter Pills

Time Magazine ^ | Nov. 21, 2005 | DANIEL WILLIAMS

[Jenny Hatch]

Bitter Pills They're prescribed to millions, but do the new antidepressants work? And are they worth the risk?

[Jenny Hatch]

There's really nothing funny about what happened to Rebekah Beddoe, except maybe for a little black comedy at the end. In 1999, a psychiatrist diagnosed her with postnatal depression, which she probably didn't have, and for the next three years multiple doctors treated her with drugs that she almost certainly didn't need. As episodes of deliberately cutting herself progressed to bouts of mental torment and suicide attempts, Beddoe's carers, concluding that her illness was worsening, kept upping her dosages and trying new medications.

Nothing worked. Eventually, Beddoe acted on a different idea. Without telling anyone, she weaned herself off the drugs and gradually became well again. Her psychiatrist at the time assumed he was responsible for Beddoe's recovery. She remembers watching him one day from the other side of his desk, thinking that this eminent doctor was congratulating himself on having the skill to concoct precisely the right drug regimen. "I could also see his relief," Beddoe says. "It had been a difficult case, but he'd finally cracked it."

These days Beddoe, 33, spends much of her time at home in Melbourne reading up on psychiatry while working on a book about her ordeal. She's certain that what made her sick were side effects of the most commonly prescribed class of antidepressants, the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). A pharmaceutical phenomenon that began with fluoxetine (Prozac) in the late 1980s, the SSRIs rode a wave of gushing publicity to usurp the older antidepressants, the tricyclics, and reap a fortune for their makers: worldwide sales now exceed $20 billion a year. But the honeymoon is over."

Honeymoon is OVER.

Jenny Hatch

[bkepley]

Next up, back surgery, chiropractors, chinese medicine. They don't work for some people and they're costing billions.

[GovernmentShrinker]

A bit obsessed with this topic, are we? Fact is, SSRIs are working well for a lot of people. They certainly don't provide a 100% fix for every depressed person, and a lot of depressed people don't seem to derive any benefit from them at all, and a small number experience serious negative side effects. And doctors aren't sure exactly how they work, or why they work in some people but not others. That makes SSRIs the same as just about every other category of pharmaceuticals.

[bluetone006]

The whole psychiatric industry is a joke. If it makes you feel better to believe in it then more power to you but you would get better results from sugar pills.

[bkepley]

I've never seen a shrink but I do have a prescription that works for me.

[yldstrk]

They work wonders for a lot of people. If this broad was switching meds constantly, she is a loon.

[bpjam]

125% of Americans have some kind of mental illness if you listen to the drug companies and the quacks who prescribe these drugs. Post-natal depression is an actual condition but what the hell does Prozac have to do with it? And why would they keep her on it for three years? This isn't medicine, its just a corrupt business. These people aren't loony, they are just troubled or problematic. And how exactly does the same drug cure post-natal depression as well as premature ejaculation??? You might as well take vitamins since they don't have side effects and aren't addictive.

[Joe Bfstplk]

Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy saved my day.

[silver charm]

To a person who has never had to live in the ongoing nightmare that some mental illness can be, the idea of a pill that can cure everything wrong in your life is just plain silly. But for someone who is living that 24/7 hell, the right medication is nothing short of a miracle.

I know.

If you are just blue cause you lost your job, your spouse is grumpy and the weather is cold and gray, than yes, these meds are not necessary. But if you live your live an unwilling captive on an out of control emotional/mental rollercoaster (think of the wildest fasted most violent ride out can) that never stops and barely even slows down when you sleep, you will understand the blessing the right drug can be.

I hope you never have to be there, but if you find yourself or someone you love on that highway to hell, you will atleast keep your mind open.

[EEDUDE]

"you will understand the blessing the right drug can be"


Bingo!

And just what makes this "Pulitzer Prize" winning author such an authority on the subject?