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A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

washingtonpost.com

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Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#51

Post by zepto »

smacktoward wrote: post #45
zepto wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide any evidence that medication cures depression at all let alone 50% of the time?

Your insistence on evidence for a "cure" is nonsensical. Doctors don't have a cure for depression at the moment, it's true. They also don't have cures for HIV/AIDS, or diabetes, or asthma, or lots of other chronic medical conditions (see https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Sta... for a list of the most common ones). But they do have medications that can make it possible for people with those cond…

Nice strawman.

I did not suggest that people should turn down medication, or refuse treatment.

I didn't say anything other than that medication doesn't cure depression - which I stand behind.

Let me turn the tables on your indignance for a moment - why don't you care about the causes of depression? If the incidence is on the rise, the causes must be getting stronger. How can you condone simply restoring people to productivity with drugs when there is an increasingly serious problem harming them in the first place?

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#52

Post by zepto »

xenadu02 wrote: post #48
zepto wrote: post #7

Depression is not caused by a deficiency of medications, but by a deficiency of hope, so medications cannot cure it.

Feeling depressed is a valid emotional state and a necessary one at certain times. It can help prompt change. Feeling hopeless or negative about the future can jolt you into action, overcome ingrained behaviors, etc. Like many other things too much depression for too long becomes clinical depression. Then it is no longer serving its proper function and becomes a pathology. People with clinical depression can't "hope"…

Why do people stay depressed for too long?

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#53

Post by zepto »

idle_processor wrote: post #21
zepto wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can provide a source showing either that a deficiency of medication is the cause of depression, or that medications do cure depression, then I will provide a source.

You made a claim: "medications cannot cure [depression]." The burden of proof is with you, not with savanaly.

Actually no, the burden of proof is not with me. I am claiming that something doesn't exist - I.e. A medication that cures depression. This is similar to saying 'there are no unicorns'. Neither statement can be proven by citation since there is always the possibility that a unicorn (or a medication that cures depression) has been overlooked.

If there is such a medication, it should be trivial for savanaly to point it out.

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#54

Post by grzm »

zepto wrote: post #52
xenadu02 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feeling depressed is a valid emotional state and a necessary one at certain times. It can help prompt change. Feeling hopeless or negative about the future can jolt you into action, overcome ingrained behaviors, etc. Like many other things too much depression for too long becomes clinical depression. Then it is no longer serving its proper function and becomes a pathology. People with clinical depression can't "hope"…

Why do people stay depressed for too long?

I'm sure that there are many reasons. One of them is that depression itself robs people of the motivation to seek out and continue with treatment.

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#55

Post by Bluestrike2 »

xherberta wrote: post #33

“It’s really hard to withdraw from antidepressants,” said New York psychiatrist and pharmacology expert Julie Holland. In some cases, “people feel like cold water is running down their spine. They can feel their brain sloshing around, or electric zaps in their head.” Dang. If it's true as claimed that medications only help half the time, this seems like a strong encouragement to try things like exercise, yoga, and li…

Especially for depression, prescribing medications is about stabilizing a patient's mental health and building a safe platform from which the patient can work to minimize the negative consequences of their depression (or many other mental illnesses, for that matter) on their daily life. No psychiatrist is going to suggest that there's a magic pill, dosage, or regimen that will make the depression go away. What medication can do, though, is help keep a patient's depression from overwhelming them. Ideally, medication gives the patient both time and enough separation from those negative emotions and consequences to make changes that become well-reinforced habits. That can be through traditional talk therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, simple exercise, changes in diet and sleep patterns, etc. Medication can serve as a sort of barrier between emotions that can overwhelm you and keep you from getting out of bed at all. It doesn't make those feelings go away entirely, but it gives you the breathing room you need.

Of course, the public doesn't necessarily see things that way. There's a common belief that the right medication will 'cure' the problem for you or, barring that, make it go away. After all, that's how other medications work! Blood pressure problems? Take a pill. Bacterial infection? Antibiotics, and poof, it's gone! That's a huge problem for psychiatry, and it's one that's probably not going to go away anytime soon. Your GP might be willing to prescribe an antidepressant, an ethical psychiatrist is almost always going to be the better choice precisely because treatment isn't about just receiving a script and heading to the pharmacy.

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#56

Post by nugget »

xherberta wrote: post #33

“It’s really hard to withdraw from antidepressants,” said New York psychiatrist and pharmacology expert Julie Holland. In some cases, “people feel like cold water is running down their spine. They can feel their brain sloshing around, or electric zaps in their head.” Dang. If it's true as claimed that medications only help half the time, this seems like a strong encouragement to try things like exercise, yoga, and li…

Medication works best in combination with therapy. A med check takes 15 minutes once a month while therapy might be 2 hours a week. You can guess which insurance covers.

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#57

Post by Retric »

zepto wrote: post #51
smacktoward wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your insistence on evidence for a "cure" is nonsensical. Doctors don't have a cure for depression at the moment, it's true. They also don't have cures for HIV/AIDS, or diabetes, or asthma, or lots of other chronic medical conditions (see https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Sta... for a list of the most common ones). But they do have medications that can make it possible for people with those cond…

Nice strawman. I did not suggest that people should turn down medication, or refuse treatment. I didn't say anything other than that medication doesn't cure depression - which I stand behind. Let me turn the tables on your indignance for a moment - why don't you care about the causes of depression? If the incidence is on the rise, the causes must be getting stronger. How can you condone simply restoring people to pro…

You are trying to redefine terms here. Depression is not the same as the underlying cause of Depression. You can go from Depressed to not Depressed without becoming normal or happy.

Further, it's not clear that the actual incidence is on the rise or if this is reversion to the mean etc. We have shifted what people call Depression and how willing people are to seek treatment. The age adjusted suicide rate was actually higher from 1950 - 1980 than it is today.

In 1950 the rates of suicide for 75–84 years old people was 31.1 in 2010 it was 15.7. If you look at the actual rate by age it's all over the map. http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0779940.html

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#59

Post by duaneb »

Bluestrike2 wrote: post #55
xherberta wrote: post #33

“It’s really hard to withdraw from antidepressants,” said New York psychiatrist and pharmacology expert Julie Holland. In some cases, “people feel like cold water is running down their spine. They can feel their brain sloshing around, or electric zaps in their head.” Dang. If it's true as claimed that medications only help half the time, this seems like a strong encouragement to try things like exercise, yoga, and li…

Especially for depression, prescribing medications is about stabilizing a patient's mental health and building a safe platform from which the patient can work to minimize the negative consequences of their depression (or many other mental illnesses, for that matter) on their daily life. No psychiatrist is going to suggest that there's a magic pill, dosage, or regimen that will make the depression go away. What medica…

I agree with what you said.

Of course, I've also heard psychiatrists call me irresponsible for going off medication that was actively holding me back from the energy and motivation I need to work well (and feel good about my life).

There is certainly a diversity of opinion amongst practicing psychiatrists even what the role of the medication is.

Re: A river of lost souls runs through western Colorado

#60

Post by forgotpwtomain »

xherberta wrote: post #33

“It’s really hard to withdraw from antidepressants,” said New York psychiatrist and pharmacology expert Julie Holland. In some cases, “people feel like cold water is running down their spine. They can feel their brain sloshing around, or electric zaps in their head.” Dang. If it's true as claimed that medications only help half the time, this seems like a strong encouragement to try things like exercise, yoga, and li…

> If it's true as claimed that medications only help half the time, this seems like a strong encouragement to try things like exercise, yoga, and lifestyle changes before going the medication route.

Medications help pharmaceutical companies make money all the time.

There is a huge incentive for this path and it's hard to come-by adequate science, since a large percentage of funding for long-term and expensive studies comes from the very same pharmaceutical companies.

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