What Doctors Don't Tell You'When you find a drug which helps you, do not try and persuade your medical advisor to cut the length of the treatment short. You may find when you take drugs that you improve quickly but do remember that depression is an illness ...'
ANTIDEPRESSANTS: They're great for two-year-olds
In Medical Monitor (September 4, 1996), Dr Richard Lawson recently recounted an unusual case of emotional illness. His female patient, whom he described as ordinarily "cheerful and open", complain ...
ANTIDEPRESSANTS: Yes, there is a safer and better way
Until recently, the only available method of helping to balance the chemistry of the brain was through a variety of drugs, which tend to dampen emotional and mental activity with undesirable side ...
New research reveals that doctors need to think twice before prescribing antidepressants, and patients should think three times before taking them.
Despite the advent of new antidepressant drugs such as the SSRIs, psychiatrists are still prescribing the older tricyclic drugs, the best known of which are amitriptyline and imipramine.
SSRIs are promoted as having fewer unwanted effects than alternatives, to be more acceptable to more patients and to be safer in overdose (and thus to decrease the risk of suicide). Two independent meta-analyses,
It's got to be worth a gamble ...
There are many better alternatives than drugs for depression. Here's a short summary. For more detailed information, see WDDTY, vol 6 no 6, and the WDDTY Guide to Mental Health
