Antidepressants Washington DC

If you were to take a peek inside the medicine cabinets of 10 women you know, odds are at least one of them would contain an antidepressant. In just three years (from 2002 to 2005), the number of prescriptions filled for these drugs jumped from 154 million to 170 million, and research shows that 1 in 10 American women now use them--which is a good thing or a bad thing, depending on whom you ask.

Part of the issue is that there's no blood test or other easy way to confirm whether someone is so depressed that medication is essential. "Unless someone can't get out of bed, I'd start with cognitive behavioral therapy [a type of talk therapy] and lifestyle changes before referring her to a psychiatrist for meds," says psychologist Alice D. Domar, PhD, an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School and senior staff psychologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. "Many people think taking a pill is an easy fix, but these drugs have side effects, and we don't know the long-term implications of taking them."

Yet many experts feel that, for the most part, the upswing in antidepressant use is a good thing. Depression is one of the biggest causes of disability worldwide; plus, it can lead to suicide. "Depression has real physical, biological and genetic roots, and these drugs can be lifesaving," says Paula Clayton, MD, medical director of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. According to a large UCLA study, suicide rates dropped steadily in the ...

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