Depression is a common affective disorder that ranges from a mild condition to severe depression whose symptoms are delusions and hallucinations. Globally, depression is the leading cause of premature death and disability. Symptoms of depression are linked which adverse reactions to everyday life situations which becomes frequent and repetitively intense. Life is characterized by different situations which people respond to it with positive and negative emotions, including sadness, anger, excitement, happiness, frustrations and fear (Rosenthal & Burchum, 2017) . Depression exists in all age groups from people in different walks of life. From the case study, the patient reported to have felt like an outsider because he was teased for being black in school, had few friends and mostly kept to himself. He reported a diminished interest in engaging in everyday activities and gained weight in the last 12 months. Moreover, he has insomnia that started six months ago, which is becoming worse every day. The patient also has low concentrations which make him get in trouble at work. The diagnosis made is that the patient suffers from severe depressions and pharmacotherapy is the recommended treatment.
Pharmacotherapy is among the standard treatment used for the patient diagnosed with severe depressions. SSRI (Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) is the recommended treatment for the severe depression that the patient has . It’s efficacy in alleviating symptom while restoring patients to better functioning has been established in the literature. SSRI pharmacotherapy for treating depression comprise acute therapy till the bests clinical remission or response is attained mostly from six to twelve months and continuation of therapy to additional six months to hinder relapse (Rosenthal & Burchum, 2017) . In other situations, maintenance therapy continues for years or months for persistent or recurrent disorders. Chance of relapse is twice high when antidepressant medication is stopped before the continuation phase ends; thus, adherence is vital even when early improvements are reported.
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The potential impacts of the SSRIs pharmacotherapy have a positive outcome on a severe depression patient’s pathophysiology . Clinical guidelines propose initiating psychotherapy for patients with mild depressions and use pharmacotherapy for severe depressions. Evidence-based studies have demonstrated that pharmacotherapy has independent and significant treatment effects in depressive disorders compared with the psychotherapy (Prescott & White, 2017). Combination of treatment with both psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy has shown to remit depressive symptoms among patients. Hence treatment must be individualized for every patient basing on the severity of the illness, response to treatment, patient preference, cost of treatments and history of depression.
When medications have been initiated for the patient, it is vital to provide them with the needed information to be efficient with the treatment. Antidepressants medications require weeks to provide their full antidepressant impact. It is also vital to inform the patient on correct adherence to the mediation and the side effects linked with treatment ( Koen & Stein, 2011). The patient must be counsel on the risk of immediately stopping the treatments as discontinuation can cause suicidal behavior and undesirable symptoms. The patient must also be aware that the medications are not addictive to remove fears of stating the medication therapy.
From evidence-based studies and existing guidelines suggests that depressions must be treated at an individual patient level. Those guidelines recommend psychotherapy for individuals with moderate symptoms because of the low risks benefit profile linked with the pharmacotherapy. The guidelines recommend combining the psychotherapy with the pharmacotherapy when the symptoms are moderate to severe. Since the patient has severe depression, the use of the pharmacotherapy is recommended as it will help alleviate those symptoms and bring the patient to normal health status.
References
Koen, N., & Stein, D. J. (2011). Pharmacotherapy of anxiety disorders: a critical review. Dialogues in clinical neuroscience , 13 (4), 423.
Prescott, D., & White, N. D. (2017). When Is Pharmacotherapy Initiation Beneficial in Patients With Depressive Disorders? American journal of lifestyle medicine , 11 (3), 220-222.
Rosenthal, L., & Burchum, J. (2017). Lehne’s Pharmacotherapeutics for Advanced Practice Nurses and Physician Assistants-E-Book . Elsevier Health Sciences.
