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on: Friday, 08 August 2008 15:06
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QUOTE (BlueJim @ Jun 8 2008, 07:14 PM) *
Thank you both kindly for the replies. It's a wonderfully helpful site with great members, I'm happy I stumbled across it.
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Depression & Mental Health FAQs
US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated 40 million Americans living today will suffer from major depressive illness during their lives. Seasonal affective disorder is major depression that appears in the fall or winter and goes away in spring, thought to be caused by lack of sunlight.
Postpartum depression occurs within four weeks of a women giving childbirth. Most new mothers suffer from some form of the �baby blues.� Postpartum depression, by contrast, is major depression, thought to be triggered by changes in hormonal flows associated with childbirth. Catatonic depression is a rare form of major depression characterized by (at least two): Stupor, excessive motor activity, extreme negativism, peculiarities in voluntary movement, and repetition of other people's words or actions. - mcmanweb.com
Psychotic depression is a rare form of depression characterized by delusions or hallucinations, such as believing you are someone you are not and hearing voices.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, approximately 18.8 million American adults, or about 9.5 percent of the US population age 18 and older in a given year, have a depressive disorder. Depression is a chronic illness that exacts a significant toll on
America's health and productivity. It affects more than 21 million
American children and adults annually and is the leading cause of
disability in the United States for individuals ages 15 to 44.
Lost productive time among U.S. workers due to depression is estimated
to be in excess of $31 billion per year. Depression frequently
co-occurs with a variety of medical illnesses such as heart disease,
cancer, and chronic pain and is associated with poorer health status
and prognosis. It is also the principal cause of the 30,000 suicides
in the U.S. each year. In 2004, suicide was the 11 th leading cause of death in the United States, third among individuals 15-24.
According to the World Health Organization, depression is presently on track to becoming the world's second-most disabling disease (after heart disease) by the year 2020. Depression is responsible for some $87 billion a year in lost productivity in the US (a conservative estimate), and according to Bank One, is responsible for most lost work days in its employees after pregnancy and childbirth. Additionally, one million people worldwide die by their own hand, most as a result of a mood disorder. Finally, the linkage between depression and a host of physical illnesses makes it arguably the world's greatest killer.
Research presented at the 56th Annual Conference of the Canadian
Psychiatric Association shows a marked link between bipolar disorder
and migraines. The odds of migraine in persons with bipolar disorder were 40% higher than the general population. Data
obtained from 36,984 people aged 15 and over, who screened positive for
manic or depressive episodes with migraine, were compared against those
who screened positive for mania but who didn�t suffer from migraines. Amongst
males, 14.9% of those with manic episodes were also diagnosed with
migraines compared with 5.8% of the general population. Amongst
females, 34.7% had both migraines and bipolar disorder compared with
14.7% who only had migraines.unquote.gif While the research was
skewed towards persons who were already diagnosed with bipolar
disorders, what does it mean for people who suffer from migraines but
who may have an undiagnosed bipolar disorder?
Migraines and headaches aren�t fully understood but the manifestations are very real and debilitating for their sufferers: Throbbing pain Nausea Heightened sensitivity to light or sound Seeing dots, wavy lines, flashing lights, or blind spots Difficulty with speech, sensation, or movement
An estimated 2.1 million
American adolescents have experienced major depression within the last
year, according to a new comprehensive government study. Researchers
surveyed more than 67,000 young people ages 12 to 17 and found that one
in 12 had suffered from serious depression in the previous year.Nearly
13 percent of girls had struggled with depression, compared to less
than 5 percent of boys. Odds of depression increased with age -- just 4
percent of 12-year-olds experienced depression but that climbed to 11
percent for older teens.
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Get Shrunk at Your Own Risk.
From: Newsweek | Date: June 18, 2007 | Author: Begley, Sharon
Byline: Sharon Begley
No one bats an eye when a drug for a severe mental illness such as schizophrenia or depression causes serious side effects such as nausea, weight gain, blurred vision or a vanishing libido. But what few patients seeking psychotherapy know is that talking can be dangerous, too--and therapists have not exactly rushed to tell them so.
For treatments that come in a bottle, the Food and Drug Administration requires proof of safety and efficacy. For treatments that come from the lips of psychologists and psychiatrists, there's no such requirement. But while therapists fight over whether they should use only treatments for which there is rigorous scientific evidence for efficacy, they have largely ignored something more fundamental. "The profession hasn't shown much interest in the problem of treatments that can be harmful," says psychology professor Scott Lilienfeld of Emory University. "Of the few psychotherapies that have been tested for safety, too many cause harm to at least some patients."
The failure to heed Hippocrates reflects the assumption that psychotherapy is, at worst, innocuous. That naive trust should have been blown out of the water when "recovered memory" therapy actually created false memories, often of childhood sexual abuse, tearing families apart. But the "Handbook of Psychotherapy and Behavior Therapy," the clinicians' bible, devotes only 2.5 pages out of 821 to adverse effects, even though documented risks of therapies could fill a small book.
"Stress debriefing," for instance, is designed to prevent symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder in those who have suffered or witnessed a trauma. In a three- to four-hour group session, a therapist pushes patients to discuss and "process" their feelings and to describe in detail what they experienced or witnessed. Many of those who undergo stress debriefing develop worse PTSD symptoms than those who deal with the trauma on their own, controlled studies show, probably because the intense reliving of the trauma impedes natural recovery. Burn victims who underwent stress debriefing, for instance, had worse PTSD 13 months later than victims who had no psychotherapy; people who went through it after being in a car crash had greater anxiety about travel three years later than those who did not.
Psychotherapy for dissociative-identity disorder (formerly called multiple-personality disorder) can pose even greater risks. Some therapists believe that the best treatment for these fractured souls is to bring out the hidden identities, called "alters," through hypnosis or helping alters leave messages for one another. Unfortunately, many alters cause "self-injurious behavior, suicide attempts, and verbal and physical aggression," notes Lilienfeld in a paper in the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science. In addition, the "let's meet the alters!" techniques can actually create alters in suggestible patients. "As more alters come out, it gets harder to get the patient back to having one identity," Lilienfeld says. The longer someone stays in therapy, the more alters show up, evidence that "many and perhaps most alters are products of inadvertent therapist suggestion." So much for "First, do no harm."
Few of us will need therapy for multiple-personality disorder. But everyone will experience grief--and counseling for normal bereavement may not always be benign. A 2000 study found that four in 10 people who lost a loved one would have been better off without grief counseling (based on a comparison with people who were randomly assigned to a no-therapy group). That was especially so for those who experienced normal grief. In that case, counseling sometimes prolonged and deepened grief, leaving more depression and anxiety than in those who worked through their loss on their own.
That 40 percent figure is likely inflated, argues psychologist Dale Larson of Santa Clara University. But he agrees with Lilienfeld's estimate that 10 to 20 percent of people who receive psychotherapy are harmed by it. Even the American Psychological Association acknowledges that too many clinicians practice "psychoquackery," as psychologist John Norcross of Scranton University puts it. If we had FDA-style regulation of psychotherapies--difficult though that would be to do, especially since the effects of psychotherapy depend on the therapist--"fringe therapies would not be on the market."
How fringe is "fringe"? In percentage terms, very. But the number of people undergoing potentially risky therapies reaches into the tens of thousands. Vioxx was yanked from the market for less. To be sure, even risky psychotherapies don't harm everyone, just as most people who took Vioxx will never have a heart attack. What is remarkable about psychotherapies, though, is that few patients have any idea that "just talking" can be dangerous to their mental health.
COPYRIGHT 2007 Newsweek, Inc.
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Depression & Mental Health FAQs 2
What is Clinical Depression? Clinical
depression can affect your body, mood, thoughts, and behavior. It can
change your eating habits, how you feel and think about things, your
ability to work and study, and how you interact with people. Clinical
depression is not a passing mood, a sign of personal weakness or a
condition that can be willed away. Clinically depressed people cannot
"pull themselves together" and get better. Depression can be
successfully treated by a mental health professional or certain health
care providers. With the right treatment, 80 percent of those who seek
help get better. And many people begin to feel better in just a few
weeks.
Depression a Big Factor in Poor Health World Health Organization Finds Depression Often Goes Untreated By Salynn Boyles WebMD Medical News Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD Sept.
6, 2007 -- Depression has a greater impact on overall health than
arthritis, diabetes, angina, and asthma, but it all too often goes
unrecognized and untreated, a report from the World Health Organization
(WHO) suggests. more... Depression a Big Factor in Poor Health
For Additional Information About Depression Write To: The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)6001 Executive Boulevard, Room 8184, MSC 9663 Bethesda, MD 20892-9663
For free brochures on depression and its treatment call: 1-800-421-4211. or visit: http://www.nimh.nih.gov
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