|
I prescribe them, and if you're interested I can link you about a million randomized, placebo-controlled trials that were NOT conducted by pharmaceutical companies that show dramatic clinical benefit of many different classes of psychiatric medications, and particularly the SSRIs (like Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, etc).
They're not perfect, and the biggest problem with them has been the paradoxical effects seen in children and adolescents (especially suicidality).
When I was a resident, I could not get depressed patients to take care of themselves, even come to routine office visits, let alone quit smoking, fix their diet, take their medications, until they were on antidepressants. So early on I began screening patients for depression, and treating them if they were depressed. And it made a dramatic difference in their ability to care for themselves and my ability to actually make any progress with them.
So I'm a huge believer, both because of the medical research and because of my own clinical experience prescribing them.
|