> Tommy Van Brocklin, 60, has suffered from depression since he was 15.
wow, ouch.
Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
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Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#42> “The treatment, known as Stanford accelerated intelligent neuromodulation therapy (SAINT) or simply Stanford neuromodulation therapy, is an intensive, individualized form of transcranial magnetic stimulation. In the study, remission typically occurred within days and lasted months. The only side effects were temporary fatigue and headaches.” > “Twenty-nine people with treatment-resistant depression participated in…
> Makes me wonder what percentage of the placebo group improved?
For future reference, assuming this is a clinical trial, data from clinical trials is available online. This is the kind of statistic that you'd be able to find.
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you for saying this. More n is required, yes, but small n results like this are a noteworthy step in the right direction. There is often good reason why n is small. Statistically significant results like this one pave the way to future experiments with larger n.
I'd also like to chime in on "effect size matters". After all, you don't need particularly large N to conclude that decapitation is going to be fatal.
Yes---
Small n studies are often the most exciting. If you get a pThe only thing that messes this logic of mine up a bit is publication bias. There's a much larger chance that small studies sit on the shelf unpublished if there's no clear effect.
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#44> “The treatment, known as Stanford accelerated intelligent neuromodulation therapy (SAINT) or simply Stanford neuromodulation therapy, is an intensive, individualized form of transcranial magnetic stimulation. In the study, remission typically occurred within days and lasted months. The only side effects were temporary fatigue and headaches.” > “Twenty-nine people with treatment-resistant depression participated in…
I wonder what results you'd get if you tried a treatment which was literal torture...?
Eg. "We'll poke this red hot poker into you 10 times to cure your depression"... Many painful screams later... "So, is the depression any better now, or should we do more treatment?".. "Yes, yes, I'm pretty much cured!".
How can we be sure that this 'torture effect' isn't whats being measured here? Especially when the treatment appears to have unpleasent side effects, and the success of the treatment is measured with patient feedback...
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#45I've been dealing with depression for over 15 years. I can only hope that this becomes available to the masses.
If you haven't had results from medication, there are a couple of new drugs on the market now that are indicated for treatment resistant depression.
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#46There are surely enough trials on depression per year that a result with 15 participants in the treatment group is to small to start bringing this to public attention? With a sample size this small I don't think it should be in the news at all
Agreed, small sample size; but in defense of the researchers, I don't think the general public appreciates how difficult it is to find research participants - nevermind a lot of them. And, ones that remain adherent to study protocol throughout it's entirety, so their data points can be included. It's also extremely expensive, and unless you're a god at writing grant proposals, most uni research labs are cash poor. Th…
Yes. It's asinine to run a large N study before having run a small one. So small N doesn't mean bad, it means preliminary.
Internet comment sections however are not great at nuance, and the difference between a bad study and a study leaving unresolved uncertainty is often beyond them.
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does this also imply the possibility of the inverse, magnetically making people depressed?
This is a great comment. I've always been a little uncomfortable with the thought of this magnetic treatment in a way I couldn't put into words and this nails it. I'm willing to trust, perhaps naively, that everyone is getting the same Prozac tablets. But how does the skill of the practitioner and maintenance of their magnetic treatment device affect outcomes? It's almost like a surgery, but I'm not sure who's actual…
It seems like a… blunt instrument.
That’s what gives me pause.
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#48> Tommy Van Brocklin, 60, has suffered from depression since he was 15. wow, ouch.
Remember this when people say depression is a temporary illness.
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#49How do the blind any form of TMS? you absolutely feel it so it's not just a matter of faking the sound
This is apparently a difficult problem. I found an article titled "Rethinking the role of sham TMS" which goes into some details.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.0021...
Re: Experimental depression treatment is nearly 80% effective in controlled study
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
Magnetic therapy makes me feel sick to my stomach for reasons that have for long been unknown to me. I'm more comfortable with the idea of undergoing electroconvulsive therapy than something that involves magnets. I'm not sure why it bothers me so much, but it does to an unusual degree.
Human emotional responses to wireless technology, even before the invention of said technology, are very interesting. Check out the wiki page for James Tilly Matthews.
Odd coincidence. The link to “pneumatic chemistry” in that article is purple because I was just reading about the history of bismuth.