| Mark Probert 2006-08-27, 4:33 pm |
| just_ed53spam@yahoo.com wrote:
> wrote:
>
>
> 1. since the controls were NOT matched for severity of depression,
> its likely that the most severely depressed were the ones which got
> drugged. It might be that all of the drugs reduced the rate of suicide
> (or not) this study doesn't show cause / effect.
>
> This point was made in parts of the news story which
> trimmed:
> "The authors warned that the statistics on suicide deaths were
> based on only eight people. These eight may have been among
> the sickest, which may have skewed the results. "
> and
> ' "In order to be due to the depression, there would have to be
> differences in depression between groups," Olfson said.
> "I can't completely exclude that possibility, and those that
> are more severely ill get more medications, '
>
> 2. The 15 to 1 was the increased likelyhood that a drugged
> kid's suicide attempt resulted in death, not the increased
> likelyhood of suicide. That would be 1.52 x 15.5, over 23 to 1.
>
> 3. These stats were pooled over all of the drugs. While
> Zoloft was the only SSRI with increased suicide attempts
> it was not the drug with the worst number for that overall.
> The 15:1 was for all drugs, not for Zoloft at all, so the title
> for this thread was wrong.
>
> Unless you have more data than the abstract and news story
> we don't know if Zoloft, specificly, was associated with any
> increased risk of death from suicide attempt. There was
> no number given for just Zoloft.
>
> Venlafaxine (Effexor) was the drug with the worst numbers (per
> the news story: "was associated with 2.3 times the risk of
> suicide attempts compared with no drug treatment at all. " ).
> This would seem to be a worse drug, except that I see
> descriptions on the web that this is used to treat "Major
> depressive disorder" so these patients were in worse
> condition that those who got milder drugs like SSRIs etc.
Very interesting points you raise. Thanks for the post.
|