Tag:

Placebo

EMPowerPlus May Be Helpful in the Treatment of ADHD

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 10/27/2024

There are many treatments available for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). But for various reasons, the treatments available — medication or psychotherapy — aren’t going to work for everyone who tries them.

That’s why over the past few years, we’ve seen the growth of the micro-nutrient industry. Micro-nutrients are usually a proprietary blend of vitamins and minerals purported to help with various symptoms. One such micronutrient blend is called EMPowerPlus, and purports to treat a range of conditions. Its website claims that EMPowerPlus has been “proven effective in reducing or eliminating the symptoms of bipolar, anxiety, depression, and ADHD.”

So how effective is EMPowerPlus in the treatment of ADHD?

10/27/2024 2 comments

What If a Sugar Pill Was Just as Effective As Psychotherapy?

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 8/12/2024

By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

What If a Sugar Pill Was Just as Effective As Psychotherapy? Yum, sugar pills! We talk about them all the time in science, where they have a much more formal and less appetizing name — placebos.

A placebo is simply something used in research to act as a treatment equivalent, so as to not bias either the research subjects or the researchers themselves in how they perceive and react to the experimental treatment. In research on drugs, this often means giving one group of patients pills that look just like the medicine being studied, but lacking any active ingredient.

In recent years, new research has emerged looking solely at the studies that were used to gain FDA approval of antidepressant medications (some of which were never published). When taken together, the studies found that antidepressant medications may not be as effective as previously thought (but what any patient who’s ever tried them could’ve told us decades ago). This recent research found effect sizes of just 0.31.

Which got some researchers to wonder… If antidepressant drug treatment effect sizes might be lower than we had thought, could the same be true for psychotherapy effect sizes too?

Could, in fact, a sugar pill offer as much change in one’s depression as months or years of intensive psychotherapy?

8/12/2024 3 comments

Can Fish Oil Help Your Brain – and Bipolar Disorder?

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 5/6/2024

By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

Can Fish Oil Help Your Brain - and Bipolar Disorder? The people of Japan experience one of the lowest bipolar disorder rates in the civilized world. Compared to the 4.4 percent lifetime prevalence rate of bipolar disorder in the U.S., in Japan it’s just 0.07 percent. That’s no typo — that’s a crazy large difference.

The Japanese don’t live a less stressful lifestyle than people in the U.S. In fact, in the white-collar world, the stress levels are often higher and the people often work harder. The Japanese people live on a small, crowded island and rely heavily on imports to sustain their way of life. Japanese schools are results-oriented, and students spend an enormous time engaged in study.

So what gives? How come the Japanese have such a low rate of bipolar disorder compared with other high-income, developed nations?

In a word: fish.

5/6/2024 14 comments

Poor Urban Depressed Patients Don’t Respond Well to Treatment

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 2/11/2024

By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

Poor Urban Depressed Patients Don't Respond Well to Treatment In a small clinical study published a few weeks ago, researchers didn’t find much difference between the three treatment groups of depressed subjects they studied — a group that received antidepressant medications, a group that received a specific type of not-commonly-practiced psychodynamic psychotherapy, and a group that received a sugar pill.

But there were some serious issues with this study from the onset, issues that call into question not only the generalizability of the results, but also their validity. It’s a shame that Reuters, who picked up on the study just yesterday, glossed over the methodology problems of the study, and instead just repeated the results as a shiny new established fact.

And easily lost in the discussion is the best result of them all — 16 weeks was all that was needed for most people in the study (who completed it) to find improvement in the symptoms of their depression, no matter what the treatment.

Let’s see what went wrong, and what the study actually tells us…

2/11/2024 3 comments

Antidepressants Overprescribed in Primary Care

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 12/13/2023

By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

Antidepressants have long enjoyed a reputation as being a quick and “easy” treatment for all types of depression — from a mild feeling of being a little down, all the way up to severe, life-debilitating depression.

But like all medications, they have side effects and instances where they should not be prescribed. Hence their continued need for a prescription after seeing a doctor.

So what does it mean when primary care physicians are handing them out like candy?

It suggests that your family doctor doesn’t really understand how antidepressants work, or what they are approved to treat. In short, it suggests that antidepressant medications are being over-prescribed by well-meaning doctors who are simply not using very good judgment.

12/13/2023 10 comments

Is Science Dead? In a Word: No

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 9/15/2023

By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

Is Science Dead? In a Word: No A few weeks ago, Jonah Lehrer wrote a somewhat dumbed-down and sensationalistic article for The New Yorker entitled, The Truth Wears Off: Is there something wrong with the scientific method? In it, Lehrer cites anecdotal evidence (and a little data) to support the proposition that perhaps the scientific method — how we scientifically validate our hypotheses with data and statistics — has gone horribly awry.

But what Lehrer failed to note is that most researchers already know about the flaws he describes, and diligently work toward minimizing the impact of those issues.

The scientific method isn’t broken. What Lehrer is describing is simply science at work — and working.

9/15/2023 5 comments

STAR*D Results Re-Analyzed, But…

by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. 7/19/2023

By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

STAR*D Results Re-Analyzed, But... At the end of August, a small journal by the name of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics published an article that sought to re-analyze the data published in the groundbreaking $35 million STAR*D clinical study. The new analysis suggested that the STAR*D researchers weren’t as forthcoming about some of their results and methodological choices as they should have been. This led to an overstatement of their results, according to the new study’s researchers.

STAR*D was a significant antidepressant milestone study, because it was government-funded (not industry-funded), had a very large sample size, followed patients for a year, and was led by a team of stellar researchers. In other words, it is the gold standard as far as studies go.

If STAR*D couldn’t find much significance for antidepressants, than what hope do we have in the treatment of depression? Is it truly all just placebo effect?

7/19/2023 3 comments