Treating Depression: Is there a placebo effect?

[Barbara]

19 February 2012
CBS 60 Minutes--Lesley Stahl interview with Harvard scierntist Irving Kirsch

(CBS News)* Do antidepressants work? Since the introduction of Prozac in the 1980s, prescriptions for antidepressants have soared 400 percent, with 17 million Americans currently taking some form of the drug. But how much good is the medication itself doing? "The difference between the effect of a placebo and the effect of an antidepressant is minimal for most people," says Harvard scientist Irving Kirsch. Will Kirsch's research, and the work of others, change the $11.3 billion antidepressant industry? Lesley Stahl investigates.

The following script is from "Treating Depression" which aired on Feb. 19, 2012. Lesley Stahl is the correspondent. Richard Bonin, producer.

The medical community is at war - battling over the scientific research and writings of a psychologist named Irving Kirsch. The fight is about antidepressants, and Kirsch's questioning of whether they work.60 Minutes Overtime
How the powerful placebo effect works »

Kirsch's views are of vital interest to the 17 million Americans who take the drugs, including children as young as six and to the pharmaceutical industry that brings in $11.3 billion a year selling them.
Irving Kirsch is the associate director of the Placebo Studies Program at Harvard Medical School, and he says that his research challenges the very effectiveness of antidepressants.

Irving Kirsch: The difference between the effect of a placebo and the effect of an antidepressant is minimal for most people.

Lesley Stahl: So you're saying if they took a sugar pill, they'd have the same effect?

Irving Kirsch: They'd have almost as large an effect and whatever difference there would be would be clinically insignificant.

Stahl: But people are getting better taking antidepressants. I know them.

Kirsch: Oh, yes.

Stahl: We all know them.

Kirsch: People get better when they take the drug. But it's not the chemical ingredients of the drug that are making them better. It's largely the placebo effect.Irving Kirsch's specialty has been the study of the placebo effect: the taking of a dummy pill without any medication in it that creates an expectation of healing that is so powerful, symptoms are actually alleviated.
[Kirsch: This is the placebo response...]

....

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_16...ect/?tag=strip

[Sheila]

This was an excellent report. Irving Kirsch was great -- kind, relaxed, smart, modest, persuasive. The guys from the FDA and pro-antidepressants were twitchy and sneering. It was pretty odd. Leslie Stahl was shocked by the new information. The audience will probably identify with her, so that's a good thing.

The facts are similar with chemo drugs -- actual statistics show they're minimally effective, if at all.

But, hey, who cares about facts?!

It's truly a case of the Emperor's new drugs, as Kirsch says. Long live Irving Kirsch!

[Luc]

Each year, the psychiatrc medication industry makes 350 billion dolllars world-wide, so, since early 90s they have made more than... 7 trillion dollars.

This is 7 trillion ----> 7,000,000,000,000 This is the most expensive placebo effect ever.

[Junior]

I cannot accept the notion that the need for these drugs soared 400% since the 80s. Sure they are being prescribed but how many of the people they are prescribed to actually NEED them? I've talked to people who were given them after telling their dr they were feeling a bit down, were suffering grief (a normal and natural process), IBS and a host of other things. As for the placebo effect, I don't know. It's possible. But for me, a tricyclic - if it did anything at all - took over a month to take effect while Paxil took only 2 weeks to lift my depression. Of course that's only me... but then I've had 5 episodes of depression so I feel I am well qualified to comment.

[stan]

bathing neurons in serotonine makes a body better, so i understand you have been better
bathing neurons in dopamine makes also a body better,
but with time the body will no more make much serotonine because he recieve an overload constantly, and then we are really in lack of serotonine and chaos...
so taking in long time is a very bad idea

[Sheila]

More info about Dr. Kirsch’s program at Harvard:

http://www.programinplacebostudies.org

[Barbara]

Thanks for finding this additional link to Kirsch's program at Harvard. You are everywhere.

[Sheila]

[stan]

a picture

[Sheila]

Ha ha! Thanks for the pictures, Stan! :)