National Post: "Psychiatrist warns against trying to cure ordinary sadness..."

The full title of this January 2014 article is "Psychiatrist warns against trying to cure ordinary sadness as Canadians among top users of antidepressants".

“It’s like cosmetic psychopharmacology: If you don’t like the way you look, you go to a plastic surgeon and get it fixed. If you’re not happy enough, go to a doctor and go on antidepressants.”

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/psychiatrist-warns-against-trying-to-cure-ordinary-sadness-as-canadians-among-top-users-of-antidepressants 

Wow, Lap, now that's an excellent article!  Excellent.  So nice to see.

"In Canada 42.6 million prescriptions for antidepressants were filled by retail drugstores in 2012, up from 32.2 million in 2008, according to figures provided to Postmedia News by prescription-drug tracking firm IMS Brogan. Citalopram (sold under the brand name Celexa), venlafaxine, (Effexor) and the generic drug, trazodone, make up the three top-selling antidepressants in Canada."

What's the bet Trazodone is in the top three because it's prescribed as an adjunct for insomnia caused by the rest of them?

“And then you get onto this thing, where you try another one, and you try a third one, and then you add some other type of drug entirely,” Paris says. “It’s a whole treadmill of pharmacology people get caught up in,” he said. Once people start taking the drugs, they’re often terrified to stop. “The fear of relapse has driven doctors to keep people on them for years,” Paris says.

Just that!  Except again, are they missing the true cause of this so-called "relapse"?

Um, excellent article until we get to the end, that is.    Yes you know I can't help myself every time I see "Mr. Ethical" himself, Allen Frances, the biggest Big Pharma shill ever.  How just the mention of this jerk's name gets my blood boiling, aarrgh! 

“The best patient for drug companies is someone who is basically healthy. Because they get the best results, and they’re the most loyal customers,” says Frances.

 

“Meanwhile, we’re shamefully neglecting the people who really need help.”

This quote from the guy who pocketed $1M from J&J to devise the perfect marketing campaign to get as many kids as possible diagnosed with Bipolar, and prescribed the AP Risperdal.  And he has the audacity to now say "we’re shamefully neglecting the people who really need help".  No seriously, guys, is he even in his right mind, I truly wonder.  Geez, I wish I were the journalist interviewing him.    End of rant.

Thanks for the great share, Lap, this is very, very encouraging to see!

Canadians now rank among the highest users of antidepressants in the world: in 2011, the last year for which comparative figures are available, Canada reported the third highest level of consumption of antidepressants among 23 member nations surveyed by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The OECD figures, contained in its recently released “Health at a Glance” report, shows Canadians consumed 86 daily doses of antidepressants for every 1,000 people per day in 2011, more than the United Kingdom (71 doses per day), Spain (64) and Norway (58). Canada was behind only Iceland (106 doses per 1,000 people per day) and Australia (89 doses) among the countries surveyed.

(The data are expressed as “defined daily doses,” which means the average daily maintenance dose for the condition for which the drug was prescribed.)[/i]

These OECD figures. How accurate are they? I would imagine it would be pretty difficult to compare the quantity of AD use in one country vs the other, as each country has different prescribing and data tracking practices. Could the other countries be under-reporting their AD use? What is the margin of error in this data?

It would be interesting to see if certain area of Canada have higher rates of AD use, lets say the difference between Ontario and British Columbia....

I, too, think it's very hard to really track how much is actually taken. I think they can see what is doled out by tracking prescriptions, but that doesn't necessarily tell you what people are taking on a daily basis. Meds can be acquired in many different ways (e.g. online, on the street, from friends or family), so there may be under-reporting. Also, some people might get a prescription but not take it as directed -- or at all.

For example, I was prescribed a number of things that I never took because I was too afraid to. In other cases, I tried one or two but had bad reactions, so I stopped.

I don't doubt that Canadians are taking a lot of antidepressants. Whether we take the most in the world or not is unclear. The article makes a lot of good points, though, including those that abcd pointed out above.

Many people also get their antidepressants as "samples" (left by drug reps) from their doctors, on a long-term basis.  I was given boxes and boxes of the newer AD's as samples at the time.  When one didn't help, I'd be switched to another and get samples of that one.  This went on for years.

I agree, it would be helpful to know the real numbers of AD prescriptions everywhere, but very hard to track for the all the reasons pointed out.  I didn't realize Canada was way up there in ranking of AD consumption, at least according to this organization.   Geez.

It's an interesting article, no doubt about it. One thing that's quite telling to me is this:

In Canada 42.6 million prescriptions for antidepressants were filled by retail drugstores in 2012, up from 32.2 million in 2008, according to figures provided to Postmedia

This is a major increase in prescriptions in just 4 years. Could it be that socioeconomic factors can be also at play? I know the article doesn't go into that, but 2008 was when we had a really bad market shakedown and a start of massive bailouts. It's like the world economy was kept together by AD's. Lots of people over the world have suffered tremendous hardship over those 4 years. I doubt this could be just explained away by concepts like "ordinary sadness".

Depression is a very complex phenomenon, and the reasons are so varied. I don't think we can just look at the AD consumption alone without looking at a lot of internal/external factors, whether they be health-related, financial, environmental, societal, global.....

I am pretty sure many people talking those antidepressants would have an extraordinary story to tell, one that goes well beyond the so-called "ordinary sadness". Yes, many people have episodes of ordinary sadness, and those pass very well on their own.

But, I do agree. It's not just the anxiety/panic and depression. It's how we treat them that it makes a huge difference.