It's one thing to read about a study disproving the therapeutic benefits of St. John's Wort, or claiming that OTC cough syrup doesn't get the job done as well as three ounces of dark chocolate. But SSRIs are in another class altogether. Antidepressants are the most commonly prescribed drugs in the United States. Over 118 million prescriptions were written in 2005.
Now, a British study done at the University of Hull claims that SSRIs just don't work for most patients. Professor Irving Kirsch combined the results of 35 clinical trials involving 5000 subjects, and found that only those suffering from the most severe cases of depression got any greater benefit from an antidepressant than they did from a sugar pill.
And Professor Kirsch isn't the first expert to question whether antidepressants are being overprescribed. Dr. Ronald Dworkin reached the same conclusion without the benefit of Kirsch's data. In his book, "Artificial Unhappiness: The Dark Side of the New Happy Class," Dr. Dworkin claims, "Doctors are now medicating unhappiness . . . Too many people take drugs when they really need to be making
changes in their lives."
It's not like SSRIs are benign happy pills. There are plenty of side effects, including anxiety, insomnia, nausea, headaches, vomiting and suicide.
So: is this just another gigantic conspiracy on the part of the big pharmaceutical companies? (Because you know how much I hate Big Pharm and love to blame everything on them).
Actually . . . yes, in part. A 2005 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that many doctors will pretty much prescribe SSRIs to any patient who asks for it. And most of those patients ask for antidepressants after seeing ads on TV or in magazines featuring shiny happy medicated people frolicking in fields.
I'm depressed just reading about this enormous scam. Think I'll go for a run - because exercise is one thing that has been proven to relieve the symptoms of depression. It's free, and all the side-effects are positive. So . . . see you on the track!
