Posted by Dinah on February 5, 2002, at 10:08:30
In reply to Read an article: getting really pessimistic...., posted by Anna Laura on February 4, 2002, at 22:56:40
How on earth do you do a study about the length of time on an antidepressant and the likelihood of relapse when it's discontinued? People who are on antidepressants for years are probably more likely to have severe and recurring (or chronic) problems with depression and are thus far more likely to relapse. How do you separate all the factors?
I guess you could put non-depressed people on antidepressants for differing lenghths of time and then study the results after discontinuance. But that would introduce different variables.
Or you could assess the severity and chronic-ness of depression in a group of people, find a group of patients with a similar profile, and randomly assign them antidepressants for varying lengths of time, and then assess the results. Is that what was done?
I'd really need to know the conditions the tests were conducted under before I believed any conclusions that were drawn from them.
poster:Dinah
thread:92902
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020131/msgs/92953.html