Depression Statistics: The Important Numbers

These days, the word depression is taken lightly. People can easily say I’m depressed for the slightest deviation in their lifestyle. They say they’re depressed when they missed the bus that morning or when it’s raining. Being depressed seems so normal but according to depression statistics, this affective disorder is plaguing the globe by storm and shouldn’t be taken lightly.

Depression is a state wherein a person is consistently sad and reluctant in participating in activities. This impairs the person’s behavior, emotions, thoughts and even physical well-being. Depressed people typically feel devoid of self-esteem, helpless, guilty, anxious, worthless or guilty. They lose interest in activities that they once enjoyed, they develop problems in their appetite, they lack concentration and they have a difficult remembering things or even making a decision. For worst cases, many people think or attempt suicide. Somatoform manifestations such as insomnia, fatigue, pains and digestive problems that don’t respond to treatment may be present.

Depression is associated with a number of physiological disruptions in the body. Changes in the neurotransmitters that help the neurons communicate with each other bring about depression in a person. These neurotransmitters include serotonin, norepinephrine and dopamine. In depression, these neurotransmitters are decreased.

In a population of 17 million people alone, there are an estimated of 5.3% prevalence of depression in adults with twelve percent women affected and seven percent men affected.  Women have a lifetime risk of being depressed because of various hormonal changes that occur in their body since puberty. In most cases, a fraction of these depression statistics are diagnosed with clinical depression.

The good news is that several studies have proven that several therapies including interpersonal therapy is effective in the prevention of depression in high-risk groups. The bad news is, there are only a few programs implanted on the prevention of depression.

There are a variety of treatments used to manage depression. Psychotherapy is done initially to assess how depression has affected the individual. A psychotherapy session is usually done by mental health professionals who include psychiatrists, psychologists, counselors, clinical social workers, psychotherapists and trained psychiatric nurses.

Pharmacologic interventions include the use of antidepressants that increase the affected neurotransmitters. These consist of tricyclic antidepressants (TCA), monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOI) and selective serotonic reuptake inhibitors (SSRI). SSRI antidepressants are the latest technology in antidepressants and are more commonly prescribed because of decreased side effects compared to its predecessors. These medications need at least two to four weeks before the therapeutic effects can be noticed. It also needs to be taken for a lifetime to be able to effectively control and manage depression.

When depression is resistant to therapies and medications, the doctors turn to their last resort, the electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). It is usually done last and reserved for those who aren’t responsive to typical treatments because of the side effects and complications associated with it.

Depression isn’t something that we could all take flippantly. The increasing depression statistics and the number of people attempting suicide every year should be taken seriously.