According to Comer, depression is a clinical disorder that causes considerable distress and impairment and features a range of symptoms, including emotional, motivational, behavioral, cognitive, and physical symptoms. Nevertheless, the picture of depression may vary greatly from person to person. Depression differs from sadness, in that sadness is context-specific, is proportional to the triggering loss, and ends when the loss situation ends (Comer, 2015).
Due to the fact that the biological approach suggests that individuals with major depressive disorder often have low levels of the neurotransmitters serotonin and noradrenaline (norepinephrine), methods of combatting depression mainly include antidepressant drugs to rectify these low levels …show more content…
Consequently, there are high relapse rates when the drugs are stopped. Moreover, antidepressant drugs compare unfavorably to cognitive treatment. Patients treated with cognitive therapy have lower relapse rates, particularly if they have been treated with drugs on more than one occasion, which suggests that cognitive therapy may be more appropriate than drug therapy, given that cognitive therapy is far less invasive as it does not have the side effects of drug …show more content…
Studies designed to assess the effectiveness of electroconvulsive therapy often compare it against simulated electroconvulsive therapy, in which patients are exposed to the equipment and believe falsely that they have received ECT. This is done to ensure that the beneficial effects of electroconvulsive therapy are genuine and not simply a placebo effect—seeing the equipment and believing that you are receiving shocks might be enough to reduce symptoms in the absence of any actual shocks. It has been found that 80% of all severely depressed patients responded well to ECT, compared with 64% response given drug therapy. Additionally, it is reported that between 65% and 85% of depressed patients had a favorable response to ECT (Ghadirian, 2015). A downside to electroconvulsive therapy is that it only focuses on the biological approach to treatment and ignores the psychological approach. Electroconvulsive therapy is generally most effective at reducing symptoms when given to both hemispheres at a high dose (Ghadirian, 2015). However, this produces the most severe side effects. Thus, therapists have to strike a delicate balance between effectiveness on the one hand and unwanted side effects on the other. Electroconvulsive therapy is clearly effective in treating unipolar depression, although it has been difficult to determine why it works so
Due to the fact that the biological approach suggests that individuals with major depressive disorder often have low levels of the neurotransmitters serotonin and noradrenaline (norepinephrine), methods of combatting depression mainly include antidepressant drugs to rectify these low levels …show more content…
Consequently, there are high relapse rates when the drugs are stopped. Moreover, antidepressant drugs compare unfavorably to cognitive treatment. Patients treated with cognitive therapy have lower relapse rates, particularly if they have been treated with drugs on more than one occasion, which suggests that cognitive therapy may be more appropriate than drug therapy, given that cognitive therapy is far less invasive as it does not have the side effects of drug …show more content…
Studies designed to assess the effectiveness of electroconvulsive therapy often compare it against simulated electroconvulsive therapy, in which patients are exposed to the equipment and believe falsely that they have received ECT. This is done to ensure that the beneficial effects of electroconvulsive therapy are genuine and not simply a placebo effect—seeing the equipment and believing that you are receiving shocks might be enough to reduce symptoms in the absence of any actual shocks. It has been found that 80% of all severely depressed patients responded well to ECT, compared with 64% response given drug therapy. Additionally, it is reported that between 65% and 85% of depressed patients had a favorable response to ECT (Ghadirian, 2015). A downside to electroconvulsive therapy is that it only focuses on the biological approach to treatment and ignores the psychological approach. Electroconvulsive therapy is generally most effective at reducing symptoms when given to both hemispheres at a high dose (Ghadirian, 2015). However, this produces the most severe side effects. Thus, therapists have to strike a delicate balance between effectiveness on the one hand and unwanted side effects on the other. Electroconvulsive therapy is clearly effective in treating unipolar depression, although it has been difficult to determine why it works so