Psychopharmacologic approaches in depression treatment

Ersan EE

[S-15] Psychopharmacologic approaches in depression treatment

Depression is one of the most common psychiatric diseases. Depression affects about one in ten people. Disability associated with depression is one of the most important health problems. Today, the most important approach in depression treatment is psychopharmacology. There are clinical and experimental studies to develop more effective treatment strategies. There is no consensus on individual treatment because the treatment response and its duration are varied between patients. There are no significant differences in terms of efficacy between antidepressant medicines. The treatment targets should be identified and the most suitable one should be preferred according to the patients’ characteristics. 1) Definite diagnosis, 2) If possible, symptoms (eg: Agitation, insomnia, memory problems) 3) the prognosis should be assessed carefully. Acute treatment should be administrated for active symptoms, maintained treatment should be administrated to prevent early recurrence, and protective treatment should be administrated to decrease the number of relapses and depression severity. In this presentation, we present you the treatment objectives, and the most important features of psychopharmacologic agents,we use.