Author Topic: Antidepressants cut risk of suicide, studies find  (Read 1166 times)

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Offline Anonymous

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Antidepressants cut risk of suicide, studies find
« on: January 01, 2006, 01:08:00 PM »
REATMENT with antidepressant drugs appears to reduce the risk of suicide in depressed teenagers and adults, new US research suggests.

The findings from two independent studies - the first of their kind - spurred some psychiatrists to call for the US Food and Drug Administration to reevaluate its warnings about the drugs, which have been blamed for a decline in their use.

The results, published yesterday, are likely to increase the controversy over whether depressed teenagers should routinely be prescribed newer antidepressants like Paxil and Zoloft. In October 2004 the Food and Drug Administration ordered drug companies to add strong warnings to the labels of antidepressants after clinical trials suggested some drugs increased the risk of suicidal thinking and behaviour in children and teenagers.

The drugs seem to make a small number of patients extremely agitated, a reaction that can lead to violent or suicidal thoughts, psychiatrists say.

Since the warning, prescriptions for antidepressants have been flat for adults and they have fallen slightly for adolescents.

Now some psychiatrists say they believe the pendulum has swung unfairly against the drugs and that depressed people are not receiving treatment that could help them.

Other doctors continue to say the drugs should be prescribed cautiously, especially because clinical trials have found they work only modestly better than placebo pills for most patients.

"The take-home message from these studies is that we have treatment that is effective and that the risk from depression is far greater than the risk of treatment," said Darrel Regier, director of research for the American Psychiatric Association, a group that has been critical of the warnings. "These studies are very important."

Some other medical professionals, however, questioned the results, saying they failed, for example, to show the drugs were more effective or safer than a placebo.

"The big bulk of the response to antidepressants is the placebo response," said Irving Kirsch, a psychologist at the University of Plymouth in England. "I don't think these studies are very informative."

Critics said the findings indicated that most patients did not benefit from the drugs. "These pills can be useful pills, but they don't match up to the hype we've had that they really cure the illness," said David Healy of Cardiff University in Wales, who added that the research could not rule out the possibility the medications increased the risk of suicide among some patients.

"As far as the risk for suicide, this sheds very little light on that issue," he said.

One of the new studies, of 3000 adults suffering from serious depression, found that about one-third experienced a full remission within weeks of taking an antidepressant, while 15 per cent experienced some improvement, meaning nearly half got at least some benefit. The second study found that the risk of suicide for both adults and teenagers dropped after treatment began.

http://smh.com.au/news/world/antidepres ... 43593.html



This article was printed in every major paper today.

Looks like TOM CRUISE has some 'splainin to do!!
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Offline Anonymous

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« Last Edit: December 31, 1969, 07:00:00 PM by Guest »

Offline Anonymous

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Antidepressants cut risk of suicide, studies find
« Reply #2 on: January 01, 2006, 06:54:00 PM »
http://www.forbes.com/lifestyle/health/ ... 29949.html

Antidepressants Work and Don't Boost Suicide Risk: Studies


SUNDAY, Jan. 1 (HealthDay News) -- Contrary to what has been feared, the antidepressants known as serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are initially effective in as many as one-third of depressed patients and don't appear to increase the risk of suicide, two new studies claim.

The reports, both of which were funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, appear in the January issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry.

The suicide findings seem to challenge a 2004 advisory by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that warned that suicidal behavior may increase after treatment with SSRIs. However, the study did find that suicide attempts were higher among teens than adults, a finding borne out by other research.

The first report is based on early data from the Sequenced Treatment Alternatives to Relieve Depression (STAR*D) trial, the largest study of its kind. This research looked at the benefits of antidepressants in "real world" settings.

"About a third of the patients achieved remission," said lead researcher Dr. Madhukar Trivedi, director of the Mood Disorders Research Program and Clinic at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, in Dallas. "An additional 10 to 15 percent achieved a response."

The object of the study was to provide physicians with guidelines for treating depression, Trivedi said. "The goal is to have patients provided with an adequate dose of medication for an adequate time," he explained. "Treatment would be tailored for each individual patient to get the most benefit from treatment."

For the study, researchers looked at the results of prescribing the SSRI Celexa to 2,876 patients with major depression. These patients also had other physical and psychological problems. The researchers found that about a third of the patients had their depression cured during the first 12 weeks of treatment.

In addition, another 10 percent to 15 percent of the patients showed a response to the medication, or reduction of at least half their symptoms. For patients who did not improve, later phases of the trial will use other medications or combinations of medications to see what might help those who did not benefit from the drug used in the first phase of the trial.

"These antidepressants in routine clinical care produce outcomes comparable with what is seen in research settings," Trivedi said. "These treatments do work in routine clinical care. There also has to be careful monitoring of side effects. In addition, you have to monitor dose and duration of the treatment, based on the patient's progression."

One expert thinks this study will eventually provide guideposts for treating depression that physicians can follow.

"This study, when it is all finally published, will give us a very good idea of how to treat treatment-resistant depression, and what the next step is after the SSRI fails," said Dr. David L. Dunner, director of the University of Washington's Center for Anxiety and Depression.

In the second study, researchers found the risk of suicide attempts and of successful suicides actually dropped in the weeks following the start of SSRI therapy.

"The risk of a serious suicide attempt in people who start taking antidepressant medication is, fortunately, quite low -- less than one in 1,000," said lead author Dr. Greg Simon, a researcher at the Group Health Cooperative, in Seattle. "The risk actually goes down after people start antidepressant medication."

The study also found no increase in suicide risk with the newer antidepressants, such as SSRIs, Simon added. "If anything, our data suggests that with the newer antidepressants there is less risk than with the older antidepressants," he said.

For the study, Simons's team collected data on 65,103 patients who had prescriptions for antidepressants between 1992 and 2003.

The researchers found the number of suicide attempts dropped by 60 percent in adults in the first month after starting treatment. The suicide rate continued to drop in the succeeding five months.

Among all the patients, there were 31 suicides in the six months after starting antidepressant therapy. That rate did not change from one month after starting treatment or in subsequent months.

However, teens had more suicide attempts than adults. Simon's group found that in the first six months of antidepressant treatment, the suicide rate was 314 attempts per 100,000 in teens, vs. 78 attempts per 100,000 in adults. For teens and adults, the rate was highest in the month before treatment and dropped by about 60 percent after treatment began, the researchers found.

In its 2004 warning, the FDA said people taking antidepressants should be closely monitored because of the risk of suicide.

"People should be closely monitored, but not because these drugs are especially risky," Simon said. "The real problem in the treatment of depression is that people start medicine and the medicine has side effects or the medicine doesn't work right away, and they get discouraged and they drop out."

Dunner agreed that close monitoring is essential when prescribing patients antidepressants. "Monitoring depression is very important," he said. "Often people come in for treatment when they are starting to get worse."

Monitoring is needed more for side effects from the drugs than to watch for suicidal behavior, Dunner said. "Suicide is a pretty rare event," he said. "It is more important to monitor for side effects and adherence to the medication."

More information

The American Academy of Family Physicians can tell you more about antidepressants.
« Last Edit: December 31, 1969, 07:00:00 PM by Guest »

Offline Anonymous

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Antidepressants cut risk of suicide, studies find
« Reply #3 on: January 02, 2006, 01:13:00 PM »
Depends on who's doin the spinnin'.

Results of antidepressant study mixed
WASHINGTON, Jan. 1 (UPI) -- Two new federally funded studies on the dangers and efficacy of anti-depressants show mixed results.

The Food and Drug Administration is being urged by some psychiatrists and the American Psychiatric Association to change warnings on the drugs, The Washington Post reports.

Darrel A. Regier, director of research for the APA, blames the warnings -- which claim the drugs could cause suicidal thoughts -- for a 10-year decline in use.

While studies show limited contradiction of the warnings, some psychologists say the studies are not accurate.

Irving Kirsch of Britain's University of Plymouth said the lack of a placebo aspect in the studies renders the findings moot.

Robert Temple, director of medical policy of the FDA, said the agency will continue to study the drugs and its policy.

Copyright 2006 by United Press International. All Rights Reserved.

Related stories:
Antidepressant prescriptions plummet (October 8, 2005) -- Warnings that antidepressant drugs can increase suicidal behavior in some children have caused a near 20 percent drop in U.S. prescriptions of the ... > full story
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/?feed=T ... ddrugs.xml

Lester Crawford resigns as FDA head (September 23, 2005) -- U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Lester Crawford resigned Friday, a little more than two months after he was elevated from acting ... > full story
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/?feed=T ... us-fda.xml

FDA leader's resignation investigated (October 27, 2005) -- The departure of a U.S. Food and Drug Administration official may be linked to stock deals involving companies regulated by the agency.

Crawford's wife said her husband's resignation was not linked to problems with financial disclosure forms, but her brother said she privately indicated it was, The New York Times reported Thursday.

The Department of Health and Human Services released Crawford's disclosure forms after a Freedom of Information request. Those forms, as reported by The Wall Street Journal, indicated that either Crawford or his wife in 2004 sold shares of several companies over which the FDA serves as a watchdog. The sales were estimated to be valued at between $1,001 and $100,000.

Other forms show transactions involving stock in FDA-covered companies in 2002 and 2003, the Times reported.... > full story

http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/?feed=T ... awford.xml
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Offline Anonymous

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Antidepressants cut risk of suicide, studies find
« Reply #4 on: January 02, 2006, 02:48:00 PM »
IMHO, those that choose to take meds do so
because they are working for them.

If the medications did not work, they would
stop.

Regardless of what a doctor, lover or family
says, if a consumer doesn't like a product
they don't use it.

I don't think types of treatments in medical
cases is any different.
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Offline Anonymous

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Antidepressants cut risk of suicide, studies find
« Reply #5 on: January 02, 2006, 04:17:00 PM »
These two studies described in Forbes do not use a control group, so they can not be used to determine if there is a difference in suicide attempts or dying of suicide as a result of their use.  If they had even compared those taking the drugs vs those seeking counseling and matched the subjects on degree of depression when first starting treatment, this too, even without a
placebo group, would have been helpful.  The studies did NOT do this.

With regards to the 28 to 33 percent complete remmision rate for those taking the drugs, in the major clinical trials that included a placebo
group, the placebo group had a similar rate of improvement.  In one of the biggest reviews, 47% of patients taking placebo had improved over a 4 to 6 week period.
« Last Edit: December 31, 1969, 07:00:00 PM by Guest »