Posted by colin wallace on July 2, 2003, at 4:02:37
In reply to Study asserts Bipolars should stay on ADs longer, posted by jrbecker on July 1, 2003, at 14:41:09
> http://biz.yahoo.com/rc/030701/health_bipolordisorder_antidepressants_1.html
>
> http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/160/7/1252
>
> Reuters
> Antidepressant regimen aids bipolar disorder-study
> Tuesday July 1, 12:02 am ET
> By Deena Beasley
>
> LOS ANGELES, July 1 (Reuters) - Patients with bipolar disorder should continue taking antidepressants even after their symptoms have eased, researchers suggested on Tuesday in a break with standard practice.
>
director of UCLA's Bipolar Disorder Research Program and a co-author of the study. "Maybe we need to be thinking of antidepressants as long-term therapy for bipolar patients who were depressed and did well on medication."
>
> The study findings appear in the July 2003 issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry.
>
>Totally agree with this.Common sense and instinct have always told me that to discontinue an antidepressant(that's working well with a mood stabilizer)would be tantamount to suicide.
As I've said before, it's fine for psychiatrists to assert that discontinuing an AD will benefit in the *long* run(what's long? Month's? Years?decades of being seriously ill?!)but for the poor sucker sitting there suffering and waiting for this theory to actually *work*...well,it just doesn't.I've tried it for a good long while.You don't miraculously appear out the other end of a black tunnel and say "wow, glad I suffered that year of suicidality without any antidepressant....I suddenly feel so much better on valproate alone!!!"
This is a pipe-dream.
poster:colin wallace
thread:238499
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20030701/msgs/238674.html