Three things for Tuesday

[tamaranth]

1. That article on how anti-depressants don't work irritated me. I need to sit down and look at the original paper to separate journalism from actual findings.

1a. "the makers of Prozac and Seroxat, two of the commonest anti-depressants, said they disagreed with the findings." MR-DA*

2. Started writing a short story. Became distracted by Research (thanks for Facilitation to ladymoonray). Now do not have time to finish story.

3. There is a place on my cheekbone / eyesocket that really really hurts if I put any pressure on it. Yes, yes, have worked out not to put pressure on it. Wonder what it is. I'm sure it will go away eventually.


Mandy Rice-Davis applies. "Well, he would say that, wouldn't he?"

Comments

[pennski.livejournal.com]

1 - yes, that was annoying and possibly very unhelpful.
3 - Does it hurt if you bend down? If so, this could be sinus trouble and I'd recommend steam.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

3 - no -- just when I press on that particular spot. So I don't. :)

[ladymoonray.livejournal.com]

I think 3 is probably sinus-related too.

Sorry for facilitating distraction (took me a while to work out how I'd done so. Now I remember. Enjoy!). Can you finish story tomorrow?

I'm just not going there with the anti-depressant thing. I don't have time to read the whole report, and probably wouldn't understand it if I did.

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

It wasn't distraction, it was relevant! But no, I can't finish the story tomorrow. Tonight or nothing, and probably the latter.

I think you're being pessimistic about your potential understanding of the report. But have a look at the post andrewducker links to (http://endofphil.blogspot.com/2008/02/antidepression.html) which clarifies the results nicely and concludes that the journalistic interpretation is, er, differently right.

[andrewducker]

There's discussion elsewhere about this. Don't know if you can see it, but here's a useful post I've seen come up: http://endofphil.blogspot.com/2008/02/antidepression.html

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this link: that's a very neat and quick summation!

You can haz link

[madcatwoman.livejournal.com]

http://medicine.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371/journal.pmed.0050045
is a link and then some to the actual article AFAIK. Haven't given it the once-over as yet, but the hoo-ha has really annoyed me. It has been proven to my satisfaction that Citalopram is all that's keeping me from the depths of depression and despair and I'm madly grateful for a drug that helps me to feel "normal" (for me...).
As for 3), I echo the sinus diagnosis.

Re: You can haz link

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

Haz got link! Is in post! (Visibility probably depends on your browser / LJ options though.)

A quick skim of it indicates they are ever so keen on the placebo effect, which I think is not justified. (Mind you, I'm not keen on the way some of the drugs were tested: six weeks doesn't seem enough to show marked improvement, and certainly it took me longer with fluoxetine.)

Thing is, nobody is forced to stay on antidepressants. We wouldn't carry on with them if they didn't work. (And although I was quite anti-ADs by the end of my time on 'em, I cannot deny that at least one of them worked pretty well on the depression.) (Citalopram, in contrast, turned me into a little weeping ball of rage. Not an improvement.)

Have a look at the blog piece linked by andrewducker -- http://endofphil.blogspot.com/2008/02/antidepression.html -- it seems clearer to me.

Re: You can haz link

[madcatwoman.livejournal.com]

Eeep, soz about that. I didn't notice it at the time because I was skimming and had just seen the link on another post on my FL. It's been that kind of day - went off to werk this morning without my watch and rings and have been a bit off my game all day.

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link. My friend the CBT researchj=er has been texting today saying how annoyed the depression pros are at the misreporting too..

[tamaranth.livejournal.com]

I think there's a lot of bad reporting on this issue. On the other hand, I think the underlying issue is with the clinical studies that were the basis of the new piece.

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

http://www.badscience.net/?p=619 is worth a read too - covering the delta between the paper and the reporting. ie several of the drugs were not SSRIs, the time scale was shorter than clinical treatments for some drugs. the whole thing is complex and results vary - but that's not a good headline!