placebo blues

There’s big money in medications for depression, and drugs such as Prozac and Wellbutrin help many people who take them. But a growing body of research finds people getting sugar pills instead of meds also feel better — making some researchers wonder if the drugs are “nothing more than expensive Tic Tacs.

That was the conclusion of a January 2010 study (“Listening to Prozac but Hearing Placebo”) published in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association.

The findings raise a moral dilemma: If patients feel better because they believe in the medications, is it right to tell them the improvement is all in their heads?

Another question is whether drugs should be the starting point for depression, or a last resort if natural therapies like exercise, probiotics, fish oil and others don’t quite lift the dark clouds.

 

 

Photo by Stefano Pollio on Unsplash.