yah typical ..got a research grant from Lilly and consulting fees from Pfizer.

January 1, 2006

" The study was financed by the U.S. National Institute of Mental

Health. Simon, the lead investigator, got a research grant from

Lilly and consulting fees from Pfizer. Philip Wang, another

researcher, was on the FDA's pediatric advisory committee that

recommended that a so-called black box warning on suicide risk be

placed on the labels of antidepressants. ........ "

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?

pid=10000087 & sid=a3h5po2f_5Tk & refer=top_world_news

Antidepressants Don't Appear to Raise Suicide Risk, Study Shows

Jan. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Antidepressants such as Wyeth's Effexor and

Eli Lilly & Co.'s Prozac don't appear to pose a higher risk of

suicide in the six months after they're prescribed, a study says.

The attempted suicide rate found in the months after treatment began

was 90 per 100,000 people while the suicide rate was 40 per 100,000

people, the study found. Neither figure represents an increased risk

``after starting antidepressant medication,'' the researchers wrote.

``The overall suicide risk associated with antidepressants is low,''

said researcher Simon, a psychiatrist with the Group Health

ative in Seattle, in a telephone interview. ``This

conventional wisdom that risk goes up after treatment doesn't seem

to be true.''

The study, published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, reviewed

records for 65,103 Group Health ative members in Washington

and Idaho who received a total of 82,285 treatments over more than a

decade.

The link between antidepressants and suicidal thoughts and self-

destructive behavior has been at issue since March 2004 when the

Food and Drug Administration warned doctors they should closely

monitor patients on 10 drugs. In October 2004, the FDA also warned

about use of the medicines for children and teenagers.

The risk of suicide attempts appeared to be greatest in the month

before patients were first treated, according to the study. There

was a smaller, significant increase in those attempts in the week

after patients received antidepressants, and then a decline over the

subsequent period, researchers said.

Drugs in Warning

The drugs include in the original FDA warning were Effexor, Prozac,

Pfizer Inc.'s Zoloft, GlaxoKline Plc's Paxil, Solvay SA's

Luvox, Biovail Corp.'s Wellbutrin, Forest Laboratories Inc.'s Celexa

and Lexapro, Bristol-Myers Squibb Co.'s Serzone and Akzo Nobel NV's

Remeron. Many of these drugs, such as Prozac, are now available in

generic form.

Prescriptions for newer antidepressants fell more than 16 percent

last year to 123 million, compared with 147 million the previous

year, according to the IMS Health Inc. Web site. The U.S. market for

the antidepressants was $7.5 billion last year.

Seligman, director of the FDA Office of Pharmacoepidemiology

and Statistical Sciences, said the agency is concerned about drug

warnings discouraging product use.

``Like with all drugs, the FDA doesn't want anything over-

prescribed or under-prescribed,'' Seligman said in a Dec. 30

telephone interview.

The researchers said there is still a possibility that

antidepressants may prompt suicidal thoughts or attempts in a group

of more vulnerable people. Teenagers, for instance, were only a

small portion of the study, with three suicides and 17 serious

attempts, the researchers said.

There are many studies that show the medicines work in adults, said

Wayne Goodman, who was chairman of the FDA panel that reviewed the

link between antidepressants and suicidal thoughts and behavior in

children and teenagers.

`Adolescents More Sensitive'

``It's conceivable that adolescents are more sensitive to side

effects,'' said Goodman, who is chairman of psychiatry at the

University of Florida.

The study was financed by the U.S. National Institute of Mental

Health. Simon, the lead investigator, got a research grant from

Lilly and consulting fees from Pfizer. Philip Wang, another

researcher, was on the FDA's pediatric advisory committee that

recommended that a so-called black box warning on suicide risk be

placed on the labels of antidepressants.

The American Journal of Psychiatry is a peer-reviewed publication

and the official journal of the American Psychiatric Association

Inc.

To contact the reporter on this story:

Theresa Barry in Washington at tbarry2@....

or Kerry Dooley Young in Washington kdooley@...;

Last Updated: January 1, 2006 00:28 EST

>

> Happy New Year everyone

> With the New Year comes more new spin from the drug pushers.

>

http://www.forbes.com/lifestyle/health/feeds/hscout/2006/01/01/hscout

529949.html

> Health

> Antidepressants Work and Don't Boost Suicide Risk: Studies

>

> SUNDAY, Jan. 1 (HealthDay News) -- Contrary to what has been

feared,

> the antidepressants known as serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)

are

> initially effective in as many as one-third of depressed patients

and

> don't appear to increase the risk of suicide, two new studies

claim.

>

> The reports, both of which were funded by the National Institute of

> Mental Health, appear in the January issue of the American Journal

of

> Psychiatry.

>

> The suicide findings seem to challenge a 2004 advisory by the U.S.

> Food and Drug Administration that warned that suicidal behavior may

> increase after treatment with SSRIs. However, the study did find

that

> suicide attempts were higher among teens than adults, a finding

borne

> out by other research.

>

> The first report is based on early data from the Sequenced

Treatment

> Alternatives to Relieve Depression (STAR*D) trial, the largest

study

> of its kind. This research looked at the benefits of

antidepressants

> in " real world " settings.

>

> " About a third of the patients achieved remission, " said lead

> researcher Dr. Madhukar Trivedi, director of the Mood Disorders

> Research Program and Clinic at the University of Texas Southwestern

> Medical Center, in Dallas. " An additional 10 to 15 percent

achieved a

> response. "

>

> The object of the study was to provide physicians with guidelines

for

> treating depression, Trivedi said. " The goal is to have patients

> provided with an adequate dose of medication for an adequate

time, " he

> explained. " Treatment would be tailored for each individual

patient to

> get the most benefit from treatment. "

>

> For the study, researchers looked at the results of prescribing the

> SSRI Celexa to 2,876 patients with major depression. These patients

> also had other physical and psychological problems. The researchers

> found that about a third of the patients had their depression cured

> during the first 12 weeks of treatment.

>

> In addition, another 10 percent to 15 percent of the patients

showed a

> response to the medication, or reduction of at least half their

> symptoms. For patients who did not improve, later phases of the

trial

> will use other medications or combinations of medications to see

what

> might help those who did not benefit from the drug used in the

first

> phase of the trial.

>

> " These antidepressants in routine clinical care produce outcomes

> comparable with what is seen in research settings, " Trivedi said.

> " These treatments do work in routine clinical care. There also has

to

> be careful monitoring of side effects. In addition, you have to

> monitor dose and duration of the treatment, based on the patient's

> progression. "

>

> One expert thinks this study will eventually provide guideposts for

> treating depression that physicians can follow.

>

> " This study, when it is all finally published, will give us a very

> good idea of how to treat treatment-resistant depression, and what

the

> next step is after the SSRI fails, " said Dr. L. Dunner,

director

> of the University of Washington's Center for Anxiety and

Depression.

>

> In the second study, researchers found the risk of suicide attempts

> and of successful suicides actually dropped in the weeks following

the

> start of SSRI therapy.

>

> " The risk of a serious suicide attempt in people who start taking

> antidepressant medication is, fortunately, quite low -- less than

one

> in 1,000, " said lead author Dr. Greg Simon, a researcher at the

Group

> Health ative, in Seattle. " The risk actually goes down after

> people start antidepressant medication. "

>

> The study also found no increase in suicide risk with the newer

> antidepressants, such as SSRIs, Simon added. " If anything, our data

> suggests that with the newer antidepressants there is less risk

than

> with the older antidepressants, " he said.

>

> For the study, Simons's team collected data on 65,103 patients who

had

> prescriptions for antidepressants between 1992 and 2003.

>

> The researchers found the number of suicide attempts dropped by 60

> percent in adults in the first month after starting treatment. The

> suicide rate continued to drop in the succeeding five months.

>

> Among all the patients, there were 31 suicides in the six months

after

> starting antidepressant therapy. That rate did not change from one

> month after starting treatment or in subsequent months.

>

> However, teens had more suicide attempts than adults. Simon's group

> found that in the first six months of antidepressant treatment, the

> suicide rate was 314 attempts per 100,000 in teens, vs. 78 attempts

> per 100,000 in adults. For teens and adults, the rate was highest

in

> the month before treatment and dropped by about 60 percent after

> treatment began, the researchers found.

>

> In its 2004 warning, the FDA said people taking antidepressants

should

> be closely monitored because of the risk of suicide.

>

> " People should be closely monitored, but not because these drugs

are

> especially risky, " Simon said. " The real problem in the treatment

of

> depression is that people start medicine and the medicine has side

> effects or the medicine doesn't work right away, and they get

> discouraged and they drop out. "

>

> Dunner agreed that close monitoring is essential when prescribing

> patients antidepressants. " Monitoring depression is very

important, "

> he said. " Often people come in for treatment when they are

starting to

> get worse. "

>

> Monitoring is needed more for side effects from the drugs than to

> watch for suicidal behavior, Dunner said. " Suicide is a pretty rare

> event, " he said. " It is more important to monitor for side effects

and

> adherence to the medication. "

>

> More information

>

> The American Academy of Family Physicians can tell you more about

> antidepressants.

>

January 1, 2006