

The Real Story On That "Antidepressant Surge" - DiabloD3
http://neuroskeptic.blogspot.com/2012/01/real-story-on-that-antidepressant-surge.html

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lunarscape
The author claims, with no supporting evidence, "the truth is that we seem to
be experiencing a cultural shift in our relationship to medications - perhaps
evidence of the creeping medicalization of life". While acknowledging there
may be other factors, it is still a huge jump to make such a claim. On a side
not one of the areas mentioned is "a 20% increase in migraine drugs". One of
the reasons for this in my own anecdotal unscientific experience is that
medications have improved substantially in the last few years with fewer side
affects. People who were simply unable to avail of medication a few years ago
can now do so, improving the quality of their lives.

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Avshalom
Other things:

Every year the massive baby boomer generation gets a little old and a little
more infirm.

De-stigmatization of mental illness means more people seek treatment.

The population simply increases (obviously not 60% but the graphs are absolute
numbers not per unit population).

We get better at diagnosing certain things.

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dmvaldman
Personally, I find our growing obsession with prescription medicine far more
interesting than the "dramatic increase" of a particular kind of medication.

Though many physicians seem opposed to the overmedication of our society, it
appears they are in the minority. I wonder if that trend will change. That
would be an interesting (though perhaps vague) statistic to track.

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jcnnghm
My girlfriend is a primary care pediatric nurse practitioner (meaning she can
prescribe narcotics, among other things), and always complains that many of
the doctors and other NPs she works with prescribe antibiotics even when it is
completely unnecessary. They do this because patients demand them, and if they
don't, many patients change doctors. Antibiotics have no effects on viruses,
but patients do not understand that, or refuse to accept it, even when the
doctor tells them. Pharmaceuticals seem to have such a pronounced effect on so
many conditions, that people believe they can cure everything.

On a side note, I can see why people could become addicted to pain killers. I
was recently hit from behind at about 50MPH, and hurt my back pretty badly.
The doctor prescribed narcotic painkillers and muscle relaxers. Because my
work is highly intellectual, I took them only when the pain was more
detrimental than the effect of the medication. In essence though, the pills
are kind of nice. They are like catching a mild (2-4 beers) buzz that lasts
all day, without any nasty side effects like difficulty sleeping or hangovers.
They kind of make you a little more relaxed and a little bit happy, with a
slight haze on the brain. And they are legal and dirt cheap, even without a
prescription plan. If you don't have to think for a living, I can see why you
would abuse them. But they seem mostly harmless overall, would it really be so
bad to give people that want them some happy pills? It's probably trading one
substance abuse problem for another, but that would be ignoring the degree. On
the other hand, the only reason I don't smoke weed is because I think it makes
people lethargic and complacent, so maybe I'm not the person to ask.

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cperciva
_Antibiotics have no effects on viruses_

True, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they should never be prescribed
to someone with a viral infection. In a small minority of patients,
antibiotics can be useful for prophylaxis.

The precise set of patients and conditions where this applies is a matter of
open debate, but (to take an extreme example) I certainly wouldn't say that a
physician would be wrong to prescribe antibiotics to an immunocompromised
infant who was hospitalized with influenza.

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6ren
In addition, the placebo effect is real. The more strongly the patient
believes, the stronger the effect. This is only a problem when trying to
determine the truth of a drug's physical action - if one's concern is helping
people, the effect is beneficial.

Of course, over-prescription of antibiotics accelerates emergence of resistant
bacterial strains. So, faux-antibiotics would be in order - provided no
patients found out, PR outrage, malpractice suits, license revocation,
bankruptcy, etc.

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ifearthenight
Good to see some analysis done of use of data in the media. Accountability in
this area is generally way too low.

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radicalbyte
It's worthy of the great @bengoldacre.

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pavelkaroukin
for me drugs are like monkey patching - really cool way to quickly fix things,
but it is addicting and can lead to huge mess in the end. Instead we should
build system to make sure long term system operate well.

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benvanderbeek
I'm going through a very difficult time in my personal life and meds have been
a crucial _supplement_ to other forms of therapy. They would be much less
impactful if the underlying issues weren't being addressed though.

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Maven911
I agree with you completely, i think the general thought process here to reach
the conclusion of 'just go exercise' is based on personal experiences, but if
you have ever seen people go through major depression, it is not that easy,
even to get them to take the meds for a few weeks because effects are not
immediate and initially they make the subject feel weird

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benvanderbeek
I'd probably need it less if I actually _did_ exercise! :/

