r/dankmemes Mar 29 '21

I am probably an intellectual or something i am beyond science

95.7k Upvotes

344 comments sorted by

View all comments

2

u/ilyasil2surgut Mar 29 '21

Don't worry, scientist don't know how antidepressants work either, in fact for most people they don't outperform placebo

3

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '21

Yep. As someone who has been going at it for 15 years, no medicine has ever worked well enough for me to want to keep taking it. I have been able to self medicate myself with just as much or more success. I know some find the meds that work for them and that’s great. I still haven’t and am sick of trying. Things like seeing a therapist or riding a roller coaster work way better. I’ve learned how to deal with the lows and know that eventually something I’m glad I didn’t miss will come along. It sucks that life is a series of long periods of manageable misery but it is what it is.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '21

Same. Probably 25 years before I finally said you know I think if it was going to work it would have happened by now and so I said fuck it, no more.

Then I said I dunno maybe if I just made it a point in my week to actually just chill out for a bit I would feel better, so I started edibles/vapes and I've never felt better honestly. I hadn't done anything of the sort since high school and I'm going on 40.

Not saying this is going to work for anybody else but for me, probably life saving.

1

u/Bourbzahn Mar 29 '21

What’s funny is that people on Reddit will refuse to accept the evidence on this, and actually label the science as “anti-science”. Despite many of the evidence based organizations concluding the same.

3

u/Xodem Mar 29 '21

It is anti science because its false. For mild to moderate Depression SSRIs don't really outperform placebo, but for more servere cases that absolutely outperform placebo, but not for everyone. And not "knowing" how they work is not equal to having no clue whatsover. Its more on the lines of "we have a number of competing therories and can't really verify them"

3

u/Bourbzahn Mar 29 '21

The massive publication bias really muddies the waters.

Antidepressant papers published over two decades of approved drugs were looked at.
12500 patients in 74 trials, with 38 trials showing positive resluts for new drugs.

37 out of 38 positive trials were published

3 out of 34 not positive were published.

11 of the negative trials were in the literature, but were written as if the drug was a success!

So reality is 38+ and 37-, while the literature showed 48+ and 3- trials. Absurd doesn’t even begin to describe this situation.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18199864

There’s the famous IQWIG findings as well, where they forced companies to give the unpublished trials as well or withhold paying for the products.

For example, in the treatment of depression other researchers have already shown that the effect of several agents has always been exaggerated in the published literature - up to 70% (on average about 30%). In the case of some agents, it is even doubtful whether a benefit is detectable at all, if all trials are considered. https://www.iqwig.de/en/press/press-releases/press-releases/pfizer-conceals-study-data.2376.html

1

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '21

I don't even see how SSRIs can not outperform placebo, I took them once and didn't like them but I could definitely tell I took something, I don't see how you could ever confuse one and a placebo

2

u/Bourbzahn Mar 29 '21

The super short summary is that 5/10 people get better when taking the medication. But more than 4/10 people get better when taking the placebo.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '21

I guess I forget how strong placebo can be

0

u/Xodem Mar 29 '21

I think you almost always know when you took them, but when you didnt get one I think you might have a hard time knowing for sure. If that makes sense

1

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '21

Ah ok