Antidepressant Usage vs. Behavioral Condition

Antidepressant Usage vs. Behavioral Condition

            The use of antidepressants for the treatment of depression is commonly prescribed as the most effective method of handling the symptoms of depression. As mentioned in previous articles, the onset of the therapeutic benefits of the antidepressants is seen a few weeks later. Most antidepressant research focuses on how to find antidepressants that take effect faster to improve the efficacy of medication. Li et al, suggests the usage of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonists such as ketamine to speed up the efficacy of antidepressants. Other proposals in research include using behavioral approaches to treat depression. Pollack et al tackles this approach using learned safety and learned fears to identify if the effects were similar to antidepressant usage. Both papers were showed the improved results of these new methods, however the actual usage of both are somewhat impractical due to the fact that some NMDA receptor antagonists like ketamine are toxic at high levels. The usage of behavioral therapy is promising; however the translation of how to apply the therapy may be impractical.

            Li et al highlights the efficacy of NMDA receptor antagonists to have a faster effect on treating depression. However the NMDA antagonists used in the paper focused mainly on ketamine. The abuse potential of ketamine is highly debated due to its toxic effects. In the paper, the lower levels of ketamine showed promising results. However if approved, the potential for abuse is high. Pollack et al demonstrated the use of learned safety to condition and improve anxiety levels. This was done by playing tones during periods of safety after rats had been shocked. When these tones were played, rats showed lower levels of anxiety. The efficacy of this behavioral approach can be useful if it can be applied to humans. However, finding a way to do so may be impractical. It may difficult to apply this approach since humans are faced with a diversity of challenges that may not work after learned safety is applied.