I finally watched the MSN video that I talked about here.
As I predicted, it was extremely lame. It was a pitch to get on depressed people on antidepressants. The 1 minute 18 second video from Today stated the following:
doctors prescribe smaller doses of antidepressants than they should
- depression is the most common cause of disability America
- the “groundbreaking new study” says antid's aren't prescribed enough to be effective
- medication and therapy can help 70 percent of patients recover IF they find the right combination
- Casey Thompson - the lady above featured in the video taking pills (hooray!) - feels amazingly better after getting antid's
The accompanying article also states that 13 percent of the 123 study participants who did not get better on the first three drugs they tried were helped by a fourth. If I'm correct, essentially 16 people were helped after trying four different antid's. The article says 37 percent went into remission after starting Celexa (citalopram), made by Forest Laboratories. That would mean about 46 people saw immediate remission of symptoms. The rest - 77 people now - “switched to another antidepressant or continued with Celexa and added a second treatment.” The second round on the merry-go-round helped 31 percent of the remaining group: 24 people. Ok, so we're now down to 53 people who haven't been helped. The third attempt - whatever that was, the article doesn't say - had a 14 percent success rate: 7 people. And the fourth attempt had a success rate of 13 percent of the leftovers: 6 people. That means 40 people were NOT helped by antidepressants are these combination of treatments. Therefore, “67 percent of the total group had been helped by one or more drugs.” Nice pitch.
Here's where the Today video fails to educate its viewers:
I finally watched the MSN video that I talked about here.
As I predicted, it was extremely lame. It was a pitch to get on depressed people on antidepressants. The 1 minute 18 second video from Today stated the following:
The accompanying article also states that 13 percent of the 123 study participants who did not get better on the first three drugs they tried were helped by a fourth. If I'm correct, essentially 16 people were helped after trying four different antid's. The article says 37 percent went into remission after starting Celexa (citalopram), made by Forest Laboratories. That would mean about 46 people saw immediate remission of symptoms. The rest - 77 people now - “switched to another antidepressant or continued with Celexa and added a second treatment.” The second round on the merry-go-round helped 31 percent of the remaining group: 24 people. Ok, so we're now down to 53 people who haven't been helped. The third attempt - whatever that was, the article doesn't say - had a 14 percent success rate: 7 people. And the fourth attempt had a success rate of 13 percent of the leftovers: 6 people. That means 40 people were NOT helped by antidepressants are these combination of treatments. Therefore, “67 percent of the total group had been helped by one or more drugs.” Nice pitch.
Here's where the Today video fails to educate its viewers: