If you want to make a dent into rates of mental health problems, make sure people have a roof over their heads, health insurance coverage, enough food to eat. Let's start there. And let's not forget Kendler: "You would not explain hypertension at the level of quarks".

Mark Horowitz Similar findings in Coupland et al. 2015 - increased risk after initiation and stopping of antidepressants bmj.com/content/350/bm…

Mark Horowitz And here are relapse/recurrence (?) rates after stopping the treatments, from controlled trials x.com/PloederlM/stat…

"My own sincere hope is that The Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines will be widely used — by doctors, pharmacists, and patients all working together — to enable far safer use of these medicines, all commonly prescribed in primary care settings." I hope so too recovery&renewal

What a thoughtful approach to putting forward an argument to trial gradual tapering to a treating team. A bit sad that a patient had to put together citations/draw up their own reductions in order to make such a proposal. Hopefully clinicians learn more about tapering

Systematic review+ meta-anlaysis finds no effect for antidepressants in older adults with dementia of all severities on depression (SMD = -0.10 (95% CI -0.26 to 0.07)) or other outcomes. Paper argues guidelines continue to recommend ADs without evidence. bit.ly/3AK5ZnL

Mark Horowitz Great read Dr Mark Horowitz. 🙌 Thank you for producing a book on guidance on how to safely get off psychiatric medications. At long last, it was needed. 👏

1. Our paper on lithium in drinking water and suicides in Switzerland was just accepted for publication. It is to our knowledge the first pre-registered study on this topic. We found a near perfect null-result.

The Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines has now been endorsed by RACGP - Hoping RANZCP follow their example. Essential to reduce patient harm from unsafe deprescribing practices of psychotropics.

New paper finds that diagnostic mental health labels (e.g. 'depression') can - increase perception individuals require treatment - increase empathy & support - reduce perceived control people have over their problems & likelihood of recovery journals.plos.org/mentalhealth/a…

The ‘staggering’ rise in childhood anxiety is not a mental health crisis | Letters theguardian.com/society/articl…

1/ Blog concludes with "I’m fairly positive about ketamine and mental health". I was really surprised by this given the evidence the blog itself cites, in addition to some crucial evidence out there the blog misses. So let me go through a few points quickly. 🧵

I wrote about how overdoses and poisonings involving antidepressants have been climbing for two decades for Guardian news . While I was working on this article, I learned a lot about antidepressants that surprised me theguardian.com/science/articl…

The website for the Psychotropic Deprescribing Council has launched. Your questions about our new nonprofit are answered here -- come visit! psychdeprescribing.org Kindly #deprescribe -- taper psychiatric drugs Surviving ADs Medicating Normal Benzodiazepine Information Coalition Mark Horowitz Jacek Debiec MD, PhD, DPhil 🌎 Bryan Shapiro MD US Deprescribing Research Network (USDeN)

Ok, most of the MDD sample were on antidepressants. Then there's some relevant COI. But most strikingly, as pointed out by several already, antidepressant treatment was not discussed as confounding variable at all.

Antidepressant withdrawal symptoms are frequently misdiagnosed as relapse. This can then lead to patients believing they need to be on the antidepressant for life.

Great to be a part of this much needed initiative The Psychotropic Deprescribing Council Psychotropic Deprescribing Council to help educate clinicians and the public about safe deprescribing of psychiatric medications. Congrats to @altostrata and the board for all their hard work.