The treatment of depression in primary care
NHS Centre for Reviews and Dissemination
Record ID 31995000033
English
Authors' objectives:
To assess which treatments are effective in the management of depression in primary care.
Authors' results and conclusions:
Clinical:Antidepressants are generally effective in the treatment of major depression but a significant number of patients drop out of treatment and many will relapse. The SSRI's are of similar efficacy to other antidepressants - standardised mean difference of 0.004 (95% CI -0.096 - 0.015). SSRI's also have similar drop out rates to the cheaper antidepressants - Odds Ratio = 0.9 (95% CI 0.86-1.07). Cognitive therapy has been shown to be as effective as usual treatment in primary care.
Authors' recommendations:
Effective strategies to improve the detection and appropriateness of treatment of depression in primary care are available. The increasing use of the SSRI's as the routine first-line treatment in major depression may result in large increases in the NHS drug budget for antidepressants and should be carefully monitored. Further research is required to evaluate a variety of management strategies for depression.
Authors' methods:
Systematic review
Details
Project Status:
Completed
URL for project:
http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/ehcb.htm
Year Published:
1993
English language abstract:
An English language summary is available
Publication Type:
Not Assigned
Country:
England
MeSH Terms
- Antidepressive Agents
- Depression
- Psychotherapy
- Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors
- Suicide
Contact
Organisation Name:
University of York
Contact Address:
University of York, York, Y01 5DD, United Kingdom. Tel: +44 1904 321040, Fax: +44 1904 321041,
Contact Name:
crd@york.ac.uk
Contact Email:
crd@york.ac.uk
Copyright:
University of York
This is a bibliographic record of a published health technology assessment from a member of INAHTA or other HTA producer. No evaluation of the quality of this assessment has been made for the HTA database.