Prozac 'no better than placebo' for treating children with depression, experts

https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/exercise-is-an-...

"Seasonal Affective Order, or SAD ... has been linked to vitamin D, otherwise known as the sunshine vitamin, because the skin absorbs it through exposure to sunlight."

https://www.va.gov/washington-dc-health-care/stories/combati...

"Consider adding some of these steps into your daily routine to improve your mood:"

"Spend time outside to get ample vitamin D ... Eat foods rich in vitamin D (salmon, eggs, tuna, etc.) Take vitamin D supplements"

“ MAH and JM are co-applicants on the RELEASE and RELEASE + trials in Australia, funded by the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) and the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), evaluating hyperbolic tapering of antidepressants against care as usual. MAH reports being a co-founder of and consultant to Outro Health, a digital clinic which provides support for patients in the US to help stop no longer needed antidepressant treatment using gradual, hyperbolic tapering; and receives royalties for the Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines. JM receives royalties for books about psychiatric drugs, and was a co-applicant on the REDUCE trial, funded by the National Institute of Health Research, evaluating digital support for patients stopping long-term antidepressant treatment. MP and RL have no conflicts of interest to declare.”

I would caution those in this thread who have never seen or treated patients in any psychiatric clinic or hospital let alone a pediatric one to be careful assuming that they have adequate experience to make sweeping judgements on the utility of antidepressants in children.

This warrants a whole different discussion, and I'll be down voted for it, but one that's never addressed: quality over quantity.

Pills are the individuals response to a society that feeds empty food, bland sterile shelter, fake friends, and meaningless jobs.

The natural human response to a lack of meaning is hopelessness, and this comes from our society. Pills helps individuals cope with continuing the meat grinder just a little while longer.

I had depression, and I cured it by finding meaning and beauty in the world. I get told "if you can cure it without pills, you never really had it" yeah cool, self fullfilling prophecy in that case innit. Can't cure it, because it doesn't exist without meds. It just comes out of "nowhere" and is here to stay.

That said, I have a tough time believing that spending an hour on Sci-Hub makes you better at diagnosis, yourself or otherwise, than someone who spent a decade being educated with decades of practicing. Thinking that you know better than trained experts because you have an understanding of the very beginning of a field is overwhelmingly tempting but is generally not based in reality. Usually the people who have actually been trained in the field know more about the field than a random person who read a few papers that they thought were "comparatively relatively simple".

I read papers all the time, usually formal methods, but sometimes other fields like medicine, and I will sometimes leave the medical paper thinking that it's "easier" than what I study, but I think that's just Dunning Kruger. I know more about formal methods, so I know a lot more about what I don't know, and thus I feel like it's harder. I don't know a ton about medicine, and since I don't know what I don't know it can feel like I know everything, and I have to fight this urge.

By all means, read about research in whatever ailment you have, I'm not really trying to discourage that, but I feel like dismissing experts in the field is almost the definition of "anti-intellectualism". If you find a study that you think is promising, bring it to your doctor. Hell, bring it to a dozen doctors, multiple opinions isn't a bad thing.

I just don't like the general "don't trust experts" thing that seems to be flying around certain circles now.