In several animal studies, zinc deficiency can cause behavior that looks like depression. In other animal studies, giving zinc can have antidepressant-like activity if the animals are zinc-deficient. And there is some clinical evidence that zinc might boost the effectiveness of antidepressants in humans. Now a large meta-analysis of studies that looked at zinc blood levels in people with depression (Swardfager, et …
Quitting Smoking Improves Mood
A study published in the British Medical Journal reports that quitting smoking had a simillar positive effect on mood as an antidepressant. The researchers did an analysis of 26 studies using a technique called a “meta-analysis” and looked at changes in mental health (anxiety, depression, mixed anxiety and depression, quality of life, positive affect, and stress) at ≥6 weeks’ post–smoking cessation …
Golden Gate Barrier Debate Highlights Misconceptions about Depression
Several of the readers of this blog sent me a link to an article that appeared in The New York Times this past week that indicated that it was possible or even likely that at the end of May the Golden Gate Bridge district would approve installing a barrier to prevent suicides. In case you don’t live near here, the …
Evolutionary Psychology and Understanding Depression
We are glad to finally have a summary of a fascinating conversation with Dr. Julio Ozores up on this site in our “Conversations” series. Dr. Ozores challenges us to think about depression in a new way. Although many of us struggle with the negative effects of depression in our lives, are (or were) there benefits to depression that have led …
Smoking Cessation Is an Antidepressant
Smoking Cessation Linked With Multiple Mental Health Benefits, Study Finds This article is reposted from the American Psychiatric Association News by permission Stopping smoking is associated with significant improvements in anxiety, depression, stress, positive affect, and psychological quality of life. And the strength of the association appears to be similar for both the general population and clinical populations, including those …
Helping Your Spouse
You have gotten help for your depression. You have seen a therapist or psychiatrist and spent long hours working to understand and improve your situation. Your spouse, who has been there for you during this process, has not. And now you are confronting the almost inevitable realization that he, or she, is really uncomfortable in the psychological world. Maybe she …
Saliva Test Identifies Teens at Risk for Major Depression
The Associated Press (2/18, Cheng) reported that according to a study published online Feb. 17 in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science, “a saliva test for teens, specifically boys with mild symptoms of depression could help identify those who will later develop major depression.” The study involved more than 1,800 teenagers aged 12 to 19. Researchers used a …
My Motivation Is Gone
Several of the people that I saw this week have been struggling with a loss of motivation. A lack of motivation can be one of the most prominent symptoms of a major depression, but there were other aspects of their loss of motivation that I found fascinating. I asked one of these patients, a man in his 40s who is …
What about Marijuana for Depression or Bipolar Moods?
Since we practice in San Francisco, which was at the forefront of the move to decriminalize marijuana, we find that many of the people with depression or bipolar have smoked, or are smoking, marijuana as a way of treating their depression. Over the years we have developed a general impression of marijuana as a psychotropic (mood affecting) agent.It has been …
Exercise or Inactivity Changes Your Brain’s Structure and Its Resilience to Stress
This past year has been a remarkable year in terms of new studies examining the effects of exercise on your brain. Everyone knows, of course, that exercise is good for you. But these studies together provide compelling evidence that exercise (and inactivity) profoundly change the structure and function of your brain. One set of studies has shown that exercise profoundly …
Maternal Warmth Protects Against the Negative Effects of Maternal Depression
I recently spent time with a friend who is a mother-to-be and struggles with depression. She was worried about how her depression might affect her relationship with her child as well as how it might affect the child’s own mental health. These are common concerns for many mothers and thankfully research is being done to address these concerns. A recent …
Mood and Menopause
What is the relationship between the hormone changes that take place around the time of menopause and depression. It seems as though there are many women who report that their depression gets worse in the peri-menopausal period, but is this a pattern? And if so what does that mean in terms of the interaction between mood and hormones? A recent …
The Trap of Stress Disability
The other day I was asked to evaluate a fellow physician by his disability insurance company. When I do disability assessments I take particular care, because what I say has big implications for the person I am evaluating, and I try very hard to do an extremely careful and thorough job of assessing the person’s situation. Three quarters of the …
Using a Therapy Light
Christmas vacation is ending, It has been wonderful to spend some relaxing time with family, getting up later in the day, lounging around and playing games, reading, or watching TV… and eating too much good food. Now the challenge is getting back to a more productive schedule. For many of us, our bodies are in a “hibernating” mode that makes …
Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation for Depression
Can direct stimulation of the brain with an inexpensive device help treat depression? Someone I have been working with for several months asked me about this product – “foc.us” – and the science behind TDCS. And, as it happened, a colleague had asked the same question a couple of weeks earlier. We were intrigued. Especially since this particular device was …
The Irony of Suicide: Book and Other Resources
One of our favorite readers sent us a link to an article entitled “The Irony of Suicide” that recently appeared in the New York Times. We liked the article and thought it might we worth reposting it here. Especially since, irony of ironies, this holiday season is for many people a time when thoughts of suicide can become very difficult …
Mediterranean Diet and Depression
Boost your brain power naturally! Try this simple intervention to reduce depression, stroke, heart disease and improve cognition. Does that statement make you a bit wary? A recent meta-analysis of 22 studies spanning two decades finds that the Mediterranean diet is associated with significant reductions in the risk of depression and stroke, and significant improvements in cognition. Across the studies, …
Sleep Therapy and Depression
What would you do if you could double the effectiveness of your antidepressants? Let’s say that this new treatment also had no known side effects, and was completely safe. That is what four studies have suggested could happen if people who were started on antidepressants received cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBTi). However, this treatment is not widely available. We …
Endurance of Pain and Suffering
He knew how to handle pain. You had to lie down with pain, not draw back away from it. You let yourself sort of move around the outside edge of pain like with cold water until you finally got up your nerve to take yourself in hand. Then you took a deep breath and dove in and let yourself sink …
Food, Mood and Cognition
We recently got a useful update on this topic from one of the clinicians who works with us at Gateway Psychiatric. She had attended a seminary of the same title from the Institute for Natural Resources. Inflammation can be associated with poor diet for example, high consumption of sugars, especially high fructose corn syrup and high saturated fat intake. Chronic …