In a large, international online survey that asked persons taking an antidepressant medication about whether they had experienced any of 20 adverse effects ‘as a result of taking the antidepressant,’ the most commonly reported adverse effects, along with the percentages of respondents who reported them, were as follows:
– ‘Feeling emotionally numb’ (71%),
– ‘Feeling foggy or detached’ (70%)
– ‘Feeling not like myself’ (66%),
– ‘Sexual difficulties’ (66%)
– ‘Drowsiness’ (63%)
– ‘Reduction in positive feelings’ (60%)
– ‘Suicidality’ as a result of the drugs (50%)
– Withdrawal effects (59%)
– ‘Addiction’ (40%).
In the Abstract, the authors concluded (emphasis in red added by us): “Asking people directly reveals far higher rates of adverse responses to antidepressants than previously understood, especially in the emotional, psychological and interpersonal domains. Given recent findings that antidepressants are only marginally more effective than placebo, the findings of the current study imply a cost-benefit analysis that cannot justify the extremely high prescription rates for these drugs.”
Are you surprised by the high rates of these reported adverse effects? Before taking the findings of this study at face value, we should look at how the study was conducted.
For many reasons, I am strongly against clinicians reading primary research studies and using them as the basis for making clinical decisions. One reason is that, in most cases, a research study cannot be interpreted in isolation; it has to be synthesized into the totality of what is known about that topic. Another reason is that extensive training and experience are needed to be able to critically evaluate a research study.
But, I do think that clinicians should know about some common and potentially serious problems with research studies—including their design, implementation, or interpretation—because they do hear about primary research studies from various sources. This is why I occasionally share some details of a research study to illustrate important principles worth knowing about.
So, let’s take the briefest possible look at the study mentioned above and see if we can’t learn a useful lesson from this exercise.
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