Patients are STILL not being warned of withdrawal pain from depression pills, ...

Patients are STILL not being warned of withdrawal pain from depression pills, say experts

By Jonathan Gornall For The Daily Mail

Published: 22:38 BST, 20 May 2019 | Updated: 22:45 BST, 20 May 2019

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Patients are still not being warned how difficult it can be to come off antidepressants, say psychiatrists campaigning for a reduction in the needless use of the drugs.

Yet the withdrawal symptoms are frequently mistaken for a relapse in the condition for which the drugs were prescribed and, as a result, patients end up being put back on them. The psychiatrists are now calling for prescribing guidelines to be updated urgently.

Under current NICE guidance, unchanged since 2004, withdrawal symptoms from antidepressants are described as ‘usually mild and self-limiting over about one week’. But both research and patients’ experience suggest otherwise, with severe symptoms including nausea, insomnia, anxiety and panic attacks that can last for weeks — or longer.

Fact: Under current NICE guidance, unchanged since 2004, withdrawal symptoms from antidepressants are described as ¿usually mild and self-limiting over about one week

Fact: Under current NICE guidance, unchanged since 2004, withdrawal symptoms from antidepressants are described as ‘usually mild and self-limiting over about one week

Major research, published by the Mail in October, confirmed that the frequency, severity and duration of reactions to antidepressant withdrawal was ‘more widespread, severe and long-lasting’ than doctors had been led to believe, with nearly half of patients suffering severe symptoms (that’s 1.8 million in Britain).

Now, in a letter published today in The BMJ, 14 of the world’s leading experts on antidepressant withdrawal are calling on NICE and the Royal College of Psychiatrists to review their guidelines urgently ‘to bring them in line with the scientific evidence base’.

They say it’s ‘concerning’ that, despite overwhelming evidence that millions of patients battle to come off antidepressants for months or even years, two recent surveys show only a tiny proportion recall being told anything about withdrawal effects, dependence, or potential difficulties coming off the drugs.

‘The guidelines are misleading doctors about the extent to which withdrawal is an issue and this is causing devastating problems for many people,’ says Dr James Davies, a reader in medical anthropology and mental health at the University of Roehampton, and one of the letter signatories. 

A review by Dr Davies, published last year in the journal Addictive Behaviors, looked at 14 studies and

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