Posted by mattdds on August 9, 2003, at 15:40:56
In reply to Re: Antidepressants 'grow brain cells' » Arthurgibson, posted by Dinah on August 9, 2003, at 8:48:16
Hi,
I've been hearing so much about this lately. Although these findings are interesting and could eventually give clues about the biology of depression, it's hard to know if these findings are applicable to humans.
I also have to wonder if someone had a spontaneous recovery, or if he/she recieved a non-somatic treatment, such as CBT or other psychotherapy (assuming it was successful), if you would see the same neurogenesis in the hippocampus.
My point is, I wonder if this is not just another biological marker in recovery from depression in general (like the whole serotonin thing apparently turned out to be), that *corresponds* with, but is not necessarily causally related to the SSRI per se. I read somewhere that SSRI treatment reduces cortisol mRNA expression in *successful* treatment, but not in unsuccessful treatment. I also wonder if *successful* *placebo* treatment (this does occur) induces hippocampal neurogenesis.
In my case, I don't care how many new neurons were growing in my hippocampus when I took Celexa, Zoloft, Paxil, and Prozac. The most important thing to me was that they significantly worsened my symptoms.
I'm not saying this is not an important finding, because it certainly is interesting and groundbreaking. I just would hate to see this become the next "monoamine hypothesis", which we all know was highly inadequate to explain depression.
I can just picture the new antidepressant commercials - presenting all the data on how SSRI's induce neurogenesis, and how they grow new brain cells. To me what is important is that they WORK!
Matt
poster:mattdds
thread:249486
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20030807/msgs/249589.html