Riportiamo uno studio condotto dal prof. Cipriani e collaboratori sull’inefficacia – e la potenziale pericolosità – degli antidepressivi in età evolutiva. Oltre all’articolo (link), ci sembrano interessanti le note del dipartimento di psichiatria dell’università di Oxford, che ricordano che il trattamento psicologico della depressione è tuttora considerato quello clinicamente più efficace (nonostante un aumento delle prescrizioni degli antidepressivi…)
Published in The Lancet, Prof Cipriani’s study found that ‘most available antidepressants are ineffective, and some may be unsafe, for children and teenagers with major depression.’
«Major depressive disorder is common in children and adolescents, affecting around 3% of children aged 6 to 12 years and about 6% of teenagers aged 13 to 18 years. Psychological treatments are recommended as the first-line treatment for depression in many clinical guidelines, and in 2004 the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) black box warning against the use of antidepressants in young people up to 24 years because of concern about increased risk of suicidality. However, use of antidepressants has slowly increased between 2005 and 2012. For example, the proportion of US children and teenagers (aged 0–19 years) taking antidepressants increased from 1.3% to 1.6%, and in the UK from 0.7% to 1.1% [3]. Sertraline is the most widely prescribed antidepressant in the USA and fluoxetine is the most common in the UK.»