Let’s talk about the current situation of depression treatment. At present, only about 50% of depressed patients in China go to psychiatric specialty hospitals for treatment, and for various reasons, only less than 15% of patients receive formal antidepressant treatment. And what about the total treatment effect?
Research data shows that the current status of depression treatment is far from optimistic. Some scholars have summarized the following figures: 30-40% of depressed patients do not respond to the first antidepressant treatment, 60-70% do not achieve a state of recovery after the first treatment, 20% do not recover after two years, and 10% are still depressed after multiple antidepressant interventions. Overall, nearly 20-30% of patients become refractory depression cases. Wu Zhiguo, Department of Psychiatry, Shanghai Mental Health Center
Generally speaking, treatment outcomes are either effective or ineffective, and strictly speaking, effective can be divided into partially effective and fully effective (i.e. cured). If we generalize effective as the goal of antidepressant treatment, there are bound to be some patients who are partially effective, which means that in them it is partially ineffective. These patients have more or less residual symptoms, and it is these residual symptoms that prevent the patients from fully recovering their social functioning and seriously affect their quality of life. An important reason for this situation is the mentality of “being rich and easy”. Patients suffering from severe depression are often afraid to accept any adjustment of the current treatment after they have achieved a little efficacy, lest they lose the part of the efficacy gained, even if they live with residual symptoms for a long time, which is also the biggest obstacle to clinical adjustment. This is the biggest obstacle to clinical adjustment of treatment.
In fact, partial effectiveness does not mean that a cure cannot be achieved, but rather that it can bring a glimmer of healing. Cure means full restoration of social functioning and full return of quality of life, which is a desirable outcome for both the individual and the family. Therefore, healing should be the goal of treatment for depression. Patients who are partially effective but have not yet achieved full efficacy may wish to make the necessary therapeutic adjustments under the guidance of a clinician and in accordance with the principles of treatment to restore the condition to an ideal state as much as possible.