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Researchers Find Antidepressants Increase Risk of Death (medicalxpress.com)
Artem Tashkinov shares a report from Medical Xpress: Antidepressant medications, most commonly prescribed to reduce depression and anxiety, increase the risk of death, according to new findings by a McMaster-led team of researchers. It's widely known that brain serotonin affects mood, and that most commonly used antidepressant treatment for depression blocks the absorption of serotonin by neurons. It is less widely known, though, that all the major organs of the body -- the heart, kidneys, lungs, liver -- use serotonin from the bloodstream. Antidepressants block the absorption of serotonin in these organs as well, and the researchers warn that antidepressants could increase the risk of death by preventing multiple organs from functioning properly.
Interestingly, the news about antidepressants is not all bad. The researchers found that antidepressants are not harmful for people with cardiovascular diseases such as heart disease and diabetes. This makes sense since these antidepressants have blood-thinning effects that are useful in treating such disorders. Unfortunately, this also means that for most people who are in otherwise good cardiovascular health, antidepressants tend to be harmful. The study has been published in the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics.
Interestingly, the news about antidepressants is not all bad. The researchers found that antidepressants are not harmful for people with cardiovascular diseases such as heart disease and diabetes. This makes sense since these antidepressants have blood-thinning effects that are useful in treating such disorders. Unfortunately, this also means that for most people who are in otherwise good cardiovascular health, antidepressants tend to be harmful. The study has been published in the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics.
That may well be and it's good to know this, however it makes little sense lowering your risk of death due to serotonin absorption blockers when you in turn either run a risk of throwing yourself off the next bridge or don't have any fun living anyway.
The tittle had me excited because I thought they'd been studying the suicide risk of depressed people on anti-depressants vs. depressed people not on anti-depressants. There have been studies done, such as this one (open access, published in the journal of the Royal Society of Medicine) found that when selective serotonin and serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors are given to adult healthy volunteers with no signs of a mental disorder, the suicide risk is doubled. Whether this doubling also occurs in depressed individuals is the real question, but this is hard to study ethically.
Anti-depressants are far more controversial than most people seem to think, and the medical field has slowly begun to admit it. Note that I'm not saying the study I mentioned or this study prove that their usage should be stopped, but at the very least they're clear indicators that more research is needed into their efficacy and potential alternatives.
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
Antidepressants block the absorption of serotonin in these organs as well, and the researchers warn that antidepressants could increase the risk of death by preventing multiple organs from functioning properly.
Is it just me? I find the whole idea of a pill curing depression rather strange. I think what we need is a more just society; a society that focuses less on material possessions or money but more on family -
whatever that may mean to an individual.
Let's remember that there are communities on this planet where depression is an unknown, especially the so called third world nations, despite their popluation's daily struggle to survive.
Yes it is just you! Although it's true that unhappiness can be a byproduct of social ills it is profoundly ignorant of you to confuse this with clinical depression. The former might trigger an epsidoe of the latter but depression, anxiety, bipolar specturm disorders, schizophrenia and other mental disorders have a neurophysiological basis.
Also, please keep the tired trope about third world nations to yourself as there is no evedince whatsoever to support the conjecture. People in third world nations who suffer mental illness are generally shunned. Those that come to harm generally have their cause of death misattributed,
Andy Warhol got it right / Everybody gets the limelight
Andy Warhol got it wrong / Fifteen minutes is too long.
The article doesn't mention a control group.
Clinical depression is an illness, and like other illnesses, it can cause a lot of physical problems. Could it be that the illness itself is causing the organ malfunctions, rather than the antidepressants?
Depression also leads to many bad habits, such as substance abuse and other addictions. Could it be that these bad habits are the real cause of the organ failures?
Antidepressants do have some nasty side effects. We've known that for decades. But this study doesn't prove it. And even if it's right, the risk of death and poor quality of life due to depression is far worse than anything caused by these side effects.