How best to care for the many adolescents who have depression? In a collaborative care intervention, a care manager continually reached out to teens—delivering and following up on treatment in a primary-care setting (the office of a pediatrician or family doctor, not a psychiatrist or psychologist) at Group Health Cooperative. Depression outcomes after a year were significantly better with this approach than with usual care, according to a randomized controlled trial published in JAMA.
When you feel really down, even a single positive change can make a real difference. But if you experiment with three small changes in one week, you may increase your chances of lifting your spirits even more.
Depression: What causes it, who gets it, and what works?
If you've been feeling down for a while, research shows telling your doctor about your symptoms is a smart choice. Depression can affect you in many ways: mentally, emotionally, and physically. To help you feel better, your doctor will work with you to check your current state, finding out if you do, in fact, have depression.
Changes in antidepressant use may have led to more teen suicide attempts.
Whether suicide occurs in a notorious shooting like Newtown, Connecticut, or as a quiet family tragedy, the question is always the same: Was there anything we could have done to prevent this?
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommended in 2009 that primary care clinicians should screen adolescents for depression. But a positive result or screen does not mean that every young person needs active treatment—including psychotherapy and medication—for depression, based on a new study in the November 19 Pediatrics led by Laura Richardson, MD, MPH, of Seattle Children’s Research Institute.
Land Acknowledgment
Our Seattle offices sit on the occupied land of the Duwamish and by the shared waters of the Coast Salish people, who have been here thousands of years and remain. Learn about practicing land acknowledgment.