Why Antidepressants Stop Working
Recently, there was an interesting article published in the Wall Street Journal entitled, “Why Your Antidepressants Seem to Stop Working—and What to Do.” The article describes a surprisingly frequent scenario of antidepressant drugs losing their effectiveness with time or simply just stop working altogether. We, at Cervella, often hear from patients who come to us because the drugs either lost their effectiveness, or the dosage needs need to be increased to remain effective. When the drug stops working patients are often prescribed a different drug but because the antidepressants are quite potent, switching drugs must be done very gradually and often new drugs change brings about new side-effects.
Cervella offers a unique solution to this problem as it can be immediately incorporated into a patient’s treatment plan with or without medication and using Cervella does not interfere with any drug-based therapies. Often times, patients reach maximum dosage for a given antidepressant and yet the drug seems to be losing its effectiveness. In this situation, we often hear that patients who incorporate Cervella into their treatment program seem to maintain their condition or are even able to lower the drug dosage (under medical supervision, of course) over time.
Most patients start to feel the positive effects of Cervella within the first few weeks of daily treatments. We recommend that patients used their Cervella device daily for full 30 minutes. Consistency is key. When patient’s condition stabilize and maximum effectiveness is reached (usually in couple of months), patients, with physician’s approval, can try to reduce treatment frequency (e.g. every other day) and also use the device during most stressful days.