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Widely used anti depressant proving ineffective to treat modern depression

Widely prescribed antidepressant barely relieves symptoms of modern depression, a major study reveals. The largest independent investigation ever undertaken for analyzing the effect of medication found patients taking ‘sertraline’ experienced negligible improvements in mood.

Published in the Lancet Psychiatry, the study comes amid mounting controversy over the increased use of antidepressants by GPs in recent decades, with roughly 7.3 million people in England issued a prescription each year. Its authors said they were “shocked and surprised” by the results, and called for the development of new classes of medication.

The trial also showed sertraline is effective in reducing anxiety, which often accompanies depression. The new trial is by far the largest to be conducted without the involvement of the pharmaceutical industry. It is also the most in-depth examination of sertraline – a type of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) – in patients with a range of depression severities, rather than just in severely depressed patients in specialist mental health units. The doctors are of the opinion to continue prescribing sertraline in the absence of other more effective drugs.

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