Posts Tagged 'SSRI'

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, clinical depression manifests itself in different ways. The types of symptoms – and their severity, frequency and duration – vary depending on the individual and his or her particular illness.

The treatments vary as well. NIMH says medication and psychotherapy are among the treatments that can be effective.

But some antidepressants come with inherent risks. A number of studies show that antidepressants classified as ...

According to an article by Keith Oken, M.D., cardiovascular diseases expert at the Mayo Clinic, congenital heart defects require ongoing monitoring. And that applies whether the defects are mild and require little medical treatment, or major and potentially life-threatening.

Oken gives this advice in response to a query from the parent of a six-year-old girl who had two heart defects — a ventricular septal defect and an atrial septal defect – ...

According to a story on Medical Xpress, a study shows that the use of antidepressants may put women at higher risk of giving birth prematurely. But depression itself doesn’t appear to be a risk factor.

The results, reported May 25 online in the journal Epidemiology, found that taking antidepressants during pregnancy significantly increased risk of what is called a late preterm birth. According to Medical Xpress, late preterm birth is defined ...

In a recent piece for political newsletter Counterpunch, writer Missy Beattie discusses her reluctance to take prescription antidepressants.

Beattie lists some of the side effects associated with the class of antidepressants known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, which include Prozac and Zoloft.

Among the reported side effects she lists are dry mouth, nausea, constipation, diarrhea, insomnia, drowsiness, headaches, tremors, heartburn, blurred vision, and anxiety and depression that could lead to ...

In a guest blog entry for Boston NPR station WBUR, Dr. Adam C. Urato, MD, maternal-fetal medicine physician at Tufts Medical Center, writes of his alarm at the growing body of literature indicating that it’s risky for pregnant women to take antidepressants.

Urato makes reference to two recent articles showing that antidepressant use by pregnant women is associated with preterm birth, one of which also showed increased rates of neonatal seizures ...

More people without any documented psychiatric condition are taking antidepressants and getting them prescribed by doctors who aren’t psychiatrists, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

The article mentions a study finding that nearly three-quarters of antidepressants in the U.S. were prescribed by non-psychiatrists in 2007, up from 60% a decade earlier. The study drew on the analysis of a national sample of 233,144 doctor office visits, the latest ...