Although we harp on this at least once every few months, it bears repeating:

Psychotherapy with medication is usually the best possible treatment option for depression (acute or chronic) for nearly everyone. If you’re only doing one or the other, you’re likely not going to get well as quickly, it’s that simple. We have decades’ worth of research showing this, but here’s another one to add to the pile.

Manber and colleagues (2008) re-examined previous data on 656 patients with chronic depression to see who would get to remission first. Remission in depression research is simply when a person’s depression score on a commonly used depression quiz (the Hamilton) falls below a certain number.

People who had scores of less than 26 on the Hamilton fared best with the combination treatment — 40% of them attained ‘full remission’ within the 12 week study period. So in just 3 months of combined treatment, your depressive feelings could be significantly decreased.

Neither psychotherapy alone nor medication alone significantly differed from one another in terms of their effectiveness in helping a person with depression in this study — they were both equally effective. However, the researchers discovered that neither treatment by itself was as effective as the combination of the two.

Some people with chronic depression give up on one or the other modality at some point in treatment. After going to therapy for years, for instance, one can certainly get a feeling that continuing it is of little use if you haven’t felt less depressed. The same is true if you’ve been taking the same antidepressant for years and find it only seems to help a little.

Combination treatment may not help in every situation or with every person. But it is the treatment of choice for virtually everyone to try, especially if this is their first time experiencing depression.

Reference:

Manber R, Kraemer HC, Arnow BA, Trivedi MH, Rush AJ, Thase ME, Rothbaum BO, Klein DN, Kocsis JH, Gelenberg AJ, Keller ME. (2008). Faster remission of chronic depression with combined psychotherapy and medication than with each therapy alone. J Consult Clin Psychol., 76(3):459-67.

Dr. John Grohol is the CEO and founder of Psych Central. He is an author, researcher and expert in mental health online, and has been writing about online behavior, mental health and psychology issues -- as well as the intersection of technology and human behavior -- since 1992. Dr. Grohol sits on the editorial board of the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking and is a founding board member and treasurer of the Society for Participatory Medicine.

Like this author?
Catch up on other posts by John M. Grohol, PsyD (or subscribe to their feed).

Comments

This post currently has 13 comments. You can read the comments or leave your own thoughts on our new comments page.

Trackbacks

Psychotherapy + Meds for Chronic Depression: Bits of health (8/7/2008)

Depression - to medicate or not to medicate « Behind the Couch (8/8/2008)

    Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 7 Aug 2008
    Published on PsychCentral.com. All rights reserved.