Scientists seeing 'dramatic improvements' in depression pill tests
Researchers in Brisbane are testing a pill they hope will have a significant effect on treating the depression as many as one in seven Australians will experience in their lifetimes.
FAB RESEARCH COMMENT:
All media headlines seek to attract attention - and as this local news article is helping to advertise and attract recruits for a study that has only just started, one can only hope that this one serves that purpose (but without unduly biasing the sample towards those who 'believe in miracles').The trial this article - and is a a randomised double-blind, placebo controlled trial, run by world-leading researchers in this area.
As the article does explain - but the headline does not - this means that at this very early stage, neither the researcher, the patients, nor anyone else can know which patients are receiving the placebo treatment, and which are receiving the nutrient combination(s) being tested against this.
The study is testing two different combinations of nutrients, each of which has already shown promise in previous trials when used in isolation, and also has good evidence in terms of known mechanisms that might have relevance to depression.
However, while 'synergistic effects' bebetween nutrients are well known as a general rule, these can be highly complex and unpredictable - hence the need for many more studies like this one to be done.
So until recruitment and data analyses have all been completed, and results peer-reviewed and published, any reports from the first participants could be purely 'placebo responses' - which are already well-known to be high from previous trials of depression and related conditions.
For more information on this subject, please see
And for previous studies by the lead researcher of this new trial, Dr Jerome Sarris, (a founder member of the International Society for Nutrition in Psychiatry Research), please see:
14 February 2015 - Brisbane Times
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University of Queensland and University of Melbourne scientists have combined several nutrients shown individually to help treat the condition in the hope they will work even more effectively together.
Lead researcher Dr Jerome Sarris said the drug combination was designed to be taken in addition to existing antidepressant medication.
He said the advantage of using a combination of nutrients as "add-ons" was that they were able to target a range of the underlying causes of depression.
"With depression medication usually they'll target one particular brain-chemical pathway such as say serotonin," he said.
"With what we know of depression there's a range of underlying factors that may cause depression biologically.
"The good thing about these nutrients is they work on a range of these pathways."
Scientists at the two universities have been testing the combination of folic acid, omega-3, zinc and other nutrients for about a year but won't know the results for another 18 months.
For the main study they'll need another 120-odd participants in Brisbane across that period. Volunteers must be taking anti-depressants but still experiencing some form of depression.
While continuing to take their normal medication the participants will be split into three groups with one taking the combination pill, one taking just one of the beneficial nutrients and the rest taking a placebo.
Dr Sarris said some volunteers had shown "dramatic improvements" but it was too early to claim success. That's because the trials are double blinded, meaning neither the researchers nor the patients know which group they are in to protect the integrity of the experiments.
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