Medication – Arch Care Services

5 years ago · Archcare

Understanding: OCD

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, or OCD, is one of those mental illnesses that everyone has heard of. This is partly because society tends to use the term as shorthand for someone who is quite clean, or who likes things to be organised, or who is very particular about how they fold their t-shirts. The phrase ‘I’m a bit OCD’ has become so commonly used that most people probably think that they have a good idea of what it’s like to suffer from OCD, but the reality is very, very different, and often much more difficult to live with, than just enjoying a neat and tidy kitchen. In fact, individuals with OCD and organisations that represent them have asked that the term not be used so casually to describe general preferences that most people experience.

In this blog we’re going to talk about what OCD actually is, how it manifests in different people, and what treatment options are available.

What is OCD?

Well, as the name suggests, OCD is made up of two different kinds of symptoms; Obsessions and Compulsions.

Obsessions are defined as intrusive or unwelcome thoughts, feelings, anxieties or images that appear in the mind seemingly without cause. Lots of people will experience this kind of thing, if you’ve ever felt anxious or nervous then you almost certainly know what it feels like to get stuck on a particular thought that you can’t seem to shift, or to have negative feelings appear in your mind suddenly. Sometimes these obsessions are called Intrusive Thoughts. The vast majority of people have experienced intrusive thoughts to some degree, if you’ve ever been in your car and have had a sudden urge to steer into oncoming traffic then you’ve had an intrusive thought, and usually they’re totally manageable and easy to ignore. What sets OCD aside from this kind of every day experience is their intensity, but also that they appear alongside Compulsions. Compulsions are defined as repetitive or ritualistic actions that are taken in an attempt to reduce or manage the anxiety associated with these obsessions.

Obsessive cleaning is one of the more common symptoms of OCD.

You’re probably aware of concept of compulsions. Whenever OCD is portrayed in the media, compulsions are generally expressed in one of two ways; hand-washing or flicking light switches. It’s true that these are common compulsions for people with OCD, but they are far from the only compulsions. Generally, compulsions fall into one of the following categories:

Washers are afraid of contamination, and will wash or clean themselves or their surroundings compulsively.
Checkers repeatedly check and confirm things, such as locks or ovens, to confirm that they are safe.
Doubters and sinners are afraid that if everything isn’t perfect and completed in specific ways then bad things will happen.
Counters and arrangers will attempt to organise and arrange things in their lives and often display obsessive behaviour or superstitions relating to coordination, counting, numbers and structure.
Hoarders fear that something bad will happen if they throw anything away, and will often collect large quantities of items or belongings.

As you can see, some of these types of compulsion have a kind of logic behind them. We can understand the anxiety associated with feeling dirty or messy, and we can see why someone would check locks and appliances. Others, such as counting or obsessively organising objects, are more superstitious in nature, and may be trickier to comprehend if you don’t suffer from OCD yourself. It’s important to understand that compulsions are real to sufferers of OCD, and that just because they don’t make sense to us doesn’t mean that they can be dismissed or ignored.

Completing compulsive behaviour usually doesn’t lead to any pleasure, but may reduce anxiety temporarily, providing some brief relief from the obsessive thoughts. This can lead to a vicious cycle, whereby obsessive thoughts lead to anxiety which leads to compulsive behaviour, which then results in temporary relief followed by further obsessive thoughts.

What is the impact of OCD?

Usually there wouldn’t be a need to include this section. Most people can inherently understand the harm caused by anxiety or depressive thoughts or hallucinations, those things are obvious. But it can be harder to truly understand the experience of someone with OCD and all the myriad of ways that it can impact on their life. Take a second to consider how long it would take to check and double check the light switches, doors and windows in each room in your house before you could leave, and what changes you would need to make to your life in order to accommodate this behaviour. It can be easy to see how the condition can end up dominating every aspect of your life, and how the obsessions can end up spiralling out of control.

Checking locks is a way of controlling the physical environment.

And control is a very important aspect of OCD. Scroll back up and look again at the categories of compulsions from earlier on. What do they all have in common? They all relate to attempts to impose control over things in our lives that are chaotic, unmanageable, unknowable or outside our sphere of influence. They all relate to a sense that if we do not complete these very specific actions, or take measures to reduce risk, that bad things will happen to us or people that we love. We all understand this to some degree, we’ve all sat at home at night on our own and heard a noise and been freaked out, and maybe we’ve then gone and checked all the doors and windows even though we know that they’re all closed and locked. We’ve all got halfway to the car before suddenly wondering whether we remembered to turn the oven off, even though we’re sure that we did, and had to go back to double check so that we can relax. Our brains are wired in such a way that we tend to assume the worst so that we can plan effectively, and we instinctively attempt to impose order and control over things in our lives. Well, people with OCD experience these very same feelings, they just experience them more often and at a much greater intensity, often to the point that they may struggle to function, and may become overwhelmed with their compulsions.

If you have time, this is a really interesting documentary about individuals living with OCD:

How is OCD treated?

If you’ve read any of my other blogs about specific mental illnesses, this will be a familiar section to you, because OCD is treated in a very similar manner to other mental health conditions; with a combination of medication and psychological therapy.

The primarily kind of medication used to treat OCD is the same kind of medication used to treat most kinds of depression and anxiety; Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, or SSRIs. This kind of medication treats OCD by reducing general levels of anxiety, and therefore reducing the obsessive thoughts that drive the compulsive behaviour. For relatively mild cases of OCD, this may be all that is needed, but in more serious cases a course of psychological therapy may be required. This therapy is usually Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, and is particularly effective at treating OCD as it teaches sufferers practical techniques that can be used to manage the intrusive, obsessional thoughts. This will generally include mental exercises, tactics for reducing anxiety and verbal prompts and reminders that help to move the mind away from the cyclical thinking that can lead to compulsive behaviour. These methods are built around the concept that the mind is a muscle that needs to be exercised and trained, and that with discipline and repetition we can build new connections so that anxiety doesn’t automatically lead to compulsive behaviour. This can include carefully encouraging sufferers to engage with their anxieties and take action that makes them feel uncomfortable, or acknowledge anxiety caused by inaction, in a controlled setting without seeking relief via compulsive behaviour. It isn’t a quick process, and can be very stressful and difficult for people seeking treatment, but success rates are good.

It’s very important to remember that simply refusing to indulge OCD symptoms, or dismissing them as silly or pointless, will not work, and can even make things worse. Some people believe that if someone with OCD would just stop washing their hands or checking the windows that this would prove that everything is fine and would ‘cure’ the compulsive behaviour. OCD treatment is not that simple, and any attempts to encourage individuals to engage with their anxieties or face their fears should only be made in controlled environments by professionals. This kind of therapy is generally known as Exposure Therapy, and may be used in place or, or in conjunction with, CBT.

Exposure therapy works by encouraging the individual to confront situations or objects that cause anxiety without relying on ritualistic behaviour. Typically this is done in a slow, controlled manner, starting with small amounts of exposure for short periods of time which is tolerated for as long as possible, and moving on to longer and more intense exposure once this is manageable. For example, someone who has rituals related to cleaning may be encouraged to touch or handle dirty objects for short periods of time. In the past this form of therapy was done in a much faster and more sudden manner, typically by introducing the individual to high levels of stress and anxiety quickly in the hope that this may have a similar effect to pulling a plaster off quickly. Nowadays this is not generally advised, as it can cause levels of stress that are difficult to tolerate.

A good way to think about exposure therapy is to think about getting into a cold swimming pool. Getting into the pool slowly, bit by bit, and waiting for your body to acclimatise to the new temperature is a lot less shocking and uncomfortable than jumping in quickly. It takes something that could be very stressful and upsetting and makes it manageable by doing it slowly in a controlled manner, and as we know maintaining control is often very important for people with OCD.

Exposure therapy is complicated and requires professional guidance and should never be attempted without proper training and supervision, as if done incorrectly it can actually make the symptoms worse.

If you or anyone you know is suffering from OCD, or you are worried that you are developing symptoms, you should always contact a GP. OCD rarely gets better on it’s own, so you should always seek help if you are concerned. If you need immediate help, or are worried that you may harm yourself or someone else, you should call 999 immediately.

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5 years ago · Archcare

Understanding: Schizophrenia

By Andy – Arch Care Services

Is there a more misunderstood mental illness than schizophrenia? Be honest, when you think of the term schizophrenia, or think of a schizophrenic person, what comes into your mind? I bet that at least some of you thought of someone with a split personality, someone like Jim Carrey from the film Me, Myself and Irene. I bet that a few of you imagined a murderer, someone who is dangerous and needs to be locked away so they don’t hurt people. It’s ok, it’s not your fault, the media has done a fantastic job of making you believe those things, almost everywhere you find the word schizophrenia in pop culture it’s accompanied by one of these images, but I’m here to tell you that it’s not the case. In fact, the most common symptoms of schizophrenia are:

A lack of interest in things
Feeling disconnected from your feelings
Difficulty concentrating
Wanting to avoid people
Hallucinations, such as hearing voices or seeing things others don’t
Delusions (which could include paranoid delusions) – strong beliefs that others don’t share
Disorganised thinking and speech
Not wanting to look after yourself

Not very dramatic, right? Also, did you notice that there’s no mention of split or multiple personalities? That’s because this has nothing whatsoever to do with schizophrenia, and is actually a completely different, and very rare, disorder, now known as Dissociative Identity Disorder. Again, you can thank Hollywood for that misconception!

Difficulty concentrating is one of the most common symptoms of schizophrenia.

So what actually is Schizophrenia then? Well, as you can see from the list above, schizophrenia is actually lots of different things and it can be difficult to define it properly. There are a lot of conditions that have very similar symptoms, and some people even believe that schizophrenia isn’t actually a single diagnosis, but is instead a collection of different disorders and illnesses all presenting at the same time and overlapping. It can develop slowly and in stages, or can appear suddenly and seemingly without warning. Around 1% of people will suffer from schizophrenia at some point in their lives.

Like most mental illnesses, schizophrenia can look and feel very different depending on the person who suffers from it, but one of the more common and distressing symptoms, and the one that makes people the most nervous, is hallucinations. Hallucinations can come in a variety of different forms, and are mostly broken down into the following categories:

Visual – Seeing things that are not present. Visual hallucinations can take the form of objects or people, but sometimes is more like shapes or lights or flashes of colour.

Auditory – Hearing things that are not present. Sometimes people hear voices and sometimes they hear random noises or jumbled sounds. When they hear voices, sometimes those voices appear to be coming from objects or spaces surrounding them and sometimes the voices are inside their heads. Sometimes the voices talk to them, and sometimes they talk to each other or just chatter.

Olfactory – Smelling things that are not present. This could be smells from objects, the environment or the person themselves.

Gustatory – Believing that food or drink has an odd or unexpected taste.

Tactile – Feeling things that aren’t present, such as tickling, stroking or poking.

The categories of hallucinations all relate to one of our five senses.

Sounds pretty unpleasant doesn’t it? Suddenly starting to experience things that no one else is experiencing can be terrifying, and most people who start to develop these symptoms find it incredibly distressing. And remember, it’s not just the experiences themselves that are distressing and frightening, it can also become very difficult to know what is real and what isn’t and trusting your senses would become increasingly difficult. This is why a lot of people who start to develop schizophrenia can isolate themselves inside, struggle to keep working or spending time with friends, and may become suspicious or confused or frightened of seeking help; they don’t know whether the things that they can see and hear and feel are actually happening.

What Causes Schizophrenia?

I get the feeling that this section is going to be the same every time we talk about causes of a particular mental illness! Just like with depression nobody really knows for sure, but there are some things that appear to make it more likely, and in most cases it is a combination of lots of different things. In order to understand the process by which someone starts to develop schizophrenia, we need to think about two separate things; causes and triggers. Causes are things that make someone more susceptible to schizophrenia, triggers are events that can cause schizophrenia to emerge.

Causes

Genetics – There is no ‘schizophrenia gene’ that we’re aware of, but there is strong evidence to suggest that a combinations of various genes make people more vulnerable to the condition. If one twin develops schizophrenia the other twin is much more likely to develop it as well, even if those twins are raised separately. The chances increase if the twins are identical.

Brain Development – Brain scans have shown that people with schizophrenia have subtle differences in the structure of the brain than those without the illness. The evidence is a little messy on this one, as not everyone with schizophrenia has these differences, and not everyone with the differences has schizophrenia, but there is some evidence to suggest that they may be connected.

Neurotransmitters – There is some evidence to suggest that an imbalance between serotonin and dopamine, or the level of sensitivity to these chemicals in the brain, may cause schizophrenia. When schizophrenics are given medication that alters the levels of these chemicals they find that some of their symptoms may decrease.

Pregnancy and Difficult Births – Studies have found that infants who are born with a low birth weight, are deprived of oxygen during birth or who are born early have an increase chance of developing schizophrenia later in life, although we don’t necessarily understand why this is.

Triggers

Stress – Stressful situations such as breakups, house moves, job loss or bereavement are a significant trigger for the development of schizophrenia. It’s important to note that stress on its own won’t cause schizophrenia, but it can cause schizophrenia to develop in individuals who are vulnerable to the illness in the first place.

Drug Use – The use of drugs, particularly cannabis, cocaine, LSD or amphetamines, has been shown to trigger schizophrenia in individuals who are already susceptible. Again, it is not believed that the use of these drugs on it’s own will lead to schizophrenia or related symptoms, but can act as a trigger.

Drug or alcohol use can act as a trigger for schizophrenia.

Three major studies have shown teenagers under 15 who use cannabis regularly, especially “skunk” and other more potent forms of the drug, are up to four times more likely to develop schizophrenia by the age of 26.

Are People with Schizophrenia Dangerous?

Admit it, when we got to the section above where I told you that schizophrenics sometimes hear voices, you probably assumed that these voices were telling them to hurt people. Again, it’s alright if you did, this is another huge misconception that has been propagated by Hollywood for years now. Sometimes you’ll even see it on t-shirts or stickers; “The Voices told me to do it!”. Well, this is another example of a poor understanding of how this stuff actually works. When someone hears voices, they can be positive, negative or completely neutral. They can give instructions or engage in conversation or just make random sounds and noises. I once knew a man who heard voices, and he described them as his ‘affirmations’ because they were always so positive!

So, is there any truth at all to the idea that schizophrenics are more likely to hurt people? Well, that’s slightly more complicated, and depends on which study you’re reading. But the important thing to remember is that even if the chances are slightly higher, the vast, vast majority of people with a diagnosis with schizophrenia will never be violent or hurt anyone. In fact, alcohol intake, gender and age are much better predictors of violence than schizophrenia.

However, there is one person that schizophrenics are much more likely to harm; themselves.

The sad fact is, around 40% of people with schizophrenia will attempt suicide at least once in their life, and around 10-15% will succeed. Compare this to the general population, where around 6-7% of people will attempt suicide at least once, and you start to see that in reality people with schizophrenia are much more likely to harm themselves than they are to commit a violent act against someone else.

How is Schizophrenia Treated?

As with most mental illnesses, schizophrenia is usually treated with a mixture of medication and talking therapies.

Anti-psychotic Medication – Anti-psychotics work by blocking the effects of dopamine in the brain. They can reduce symptoms of aggressive or anxiety very quickly, but generally take longer to start to tackle other symptoms such as hallucinations. This kind of medication is usually only prescribed following a thorough physical check up, because they can have a lot of side effects. More detailed information about anti-psychotic medication can be found by clicking here.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapies – I’ve already spoken about CBT and how it works, so you can find full information on our Understanding: Depression blog. Alternatively you can click here for more information.

There is also some evidence that shows that art therapy can be very effective as a way to alleviate the negative symptoms of schizophrenia in some people, although this should only be carried out by a trained art therapist with experience working with individuals with the diagnosis.

I hope that this blog has been useful, and that you now feel more able to correct some of those harmful stereotypes that we mentioned at the start! It’s important to remember that people with schizophrenia are suffering from an illness and need our support and empathy, and that we shouldn’t always rely on the media and Hollywood to give us an accurate representation of how people with schizophrenia feel, act and relate to others.

If you have any concerns about your own mental health, or if you believe that you are suffering from any of the symptoms of schizophrenia, you should contact your GP straight away. If you feel low and need someone to talk to, you can contact The Samaritans 24 hours a day, 7 days a week on 116 123. If you need immediate help, or are worried that you may harm yourself or someone else, you should always contact 999 immediately.

For more information, you can check out these links:

Mind – Schizophrenia

Information about Hearing Voices

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6 years ago · Archcare

Understanding: Depression

By Andy – Arch Care Services

Depression is the most common mental illness across the world. The Office of National Statistics estimates that around 20% of the UK population aged 16 and over show some signs of depression. In fact, in 26 countries depression is the most common kind of disability reported. But despite being so common, depression is also widely misunderstood, and there are a lot of misconceptions floating around regarding how depression presents itself and how to treat or manage the condition. This week we’re going to be looking at the causes of depression, how depression manifests for different people, and the various ways that it is treated and managed.

What causes Depression?

The truth is, we don’t exactly know. If you injure yourself physically it’s usually pretty easy to work out how you did it. If you fall off your bike and afterwards are told that you have a broken arm it’s probably fairly straightforward to work out what happened! But if you’re suffering from depression it’s difficult to isolate the exact cause, as it’s probably a variety of things or sometimes nothing specific at all. But we can identify some common trends that seem to apply more often than others:

Childhood Experiences

Nowadays we don’t tend to ask people to lie down on the sofa and talk about their parents when they go for counselling, but there is a lot of evidence that suggests that things that happen to us when we’re children can have a major impact on our emotions when we get older. And it’s not always major traumatic events, although these can also cause depression as well. Sometimes it’s a general instability or a lack of support, things that may not seem too significant but add up over the years. It certainly appears that what happens to us when we’re younger can have an effect on our mental health when we’re adults.

Genetics

Now we’re getting into the old ‘Nature vs Nurture’ debate! There is a lot of evidence out there that seems to suggest that if we have close family members with depression, we’re more likely to suffer from depression ourselves. Now, whether this is because there is a ‘depression gene’ hidden away somewhere in our brains, or whether it’s because we’re likely to have been brought up and had experiences that are similar to close family members isn’t as obvious, but there certainly seems to be a connection.

Life Events

This is one that most people will understand, because we’ve all had sad, stressful or emotionally difficult experiences that impacted us afterwards. The death of a loved one, a breakup or a major change such as a house move or job loss can be emotionally straining, and sometimes that strain can stay with us for a while. For some people, these events can be a trigger for a more serious episode of depression.

Physical Health Problems

Our physical and mental health are very closely linked, and changes to one can cause or contribute towards changes in the other. Sometimes those connections are direct, such as a brain injury that may affect the physical structure of the brain, or hormonal problems that impact on the way that the brain produces certain chemicals, or they may be indirect and caused by stress or difficulties in managing a condition, such as chronic or life threatening illnesses, or disabilities that may cause significant changes or limitations to your lifestyle.

Exercise and diet can also affect our mental health, with depression being a common outcome of unhealthy lifestyles and habits. There is significant evidence that physical exercise and a healthy diet can have a major positive impact on our mood, so consider digging out those running shoes! But remember, it’s ok to seek alternative treatments (including medication) if that works for you, lifestyle changes may not work on their own for some people.

Drugs, Alcohol or Prescribed Medication

Drug and alcohol use can be both a cause and an effect of depression, which can lead to a vicious cycle whereby people feel low, use drugs or alcohol in an attempt to feel better, which only makes them feel worse, leading to increased use of the very same substances. I could write an entire blog on how street drugs affect mental health, but for now Mind have a fantastic guide.

Depression can also be a side effect of many prescribed drugs, including some anti-depressant medication. Make sure you always read the leaflets that some with your medication and take them as prescribed, and if you have any concerns you should contact your GP immediately, as these side effects can be serious.

The causes of depression are far from clear-cut, and in most cases are likely caused by a variety of different things all acting in conjunction. It’s also important to remember that we all cope with things differently, so people will have varying degrees of tolerance to stress or trauma and will react in completely different ways. The same life event could cause me to become depressed and have no affect on you whatsoever, and that doesn’t mean that you’re emotionally stronger than I am or that I’m a weak person! We are all different and deal with things differently, and that’s absolutely fine.

Symptoms of Depression

Depression has come to be used as another word for sad, so when we say the word depression we naturally think that depressed people must feel sad. Personally, when I hear the word depression the following picture pops into my head:

These kinds of pictures are used a lot in the media when they talk about depression, but they’re not really a good representation of what a mental illness actually feels like. This might be why some people find it really hard to understand just how serious and difficult depression can be. After all, they know what it’s like to be sad, they felt a bit sad last week and then they watched some television and went for a walk and then they felt fine, so why is everyone always complaining about feeling depressed all the time? Since we already know that around 20% of adults will display some symptoms of depression at some point in their lives and that not everyone who has depression is sad all of the time, maybe a better image to use would be something like this:

Or this:

Or even this:

Of course, depression is much, much more than just a feeling of sadness. Some of the most common symptoms of depression are:

Low self esteem, or a feeling of worthlessness.
Intense sadness or unhappiness that doesn’t improve.
Being unable to enjoy or appreciate things that would normally make you happy.
Weight loss or weight gain.
Sleeping too much or too little.
Difficulty concentrating or focussing.
A sense of hopelessness or despair.
Physical aches or pains, especially in the head, shoulders, back or stomach with no obvious cause.
Feeling isolated or detached and avoiding people or social situations
Mood swings.
Use or increase in consumption of drugs, alcohol or tobacco.
Moving very slowly or feeling anxious and agitated and moving too much.
Self harm or suicidal thoughts or actions.

Have you noticed that some of these symptoms are complete opposites? That’s one of the most unusual things about depression, it can cause completely different symptoms in different people or at different times, but is still classed as the same illness. One person could be tired all the time and sleep too much, gain weight and struggle to speak to people, and another could lose weight quickly, struggle to sleep and have too much energy throughout the day and they could both be diagnosed with depression. This is one of the reasons why it can be so difficult to identify and diagnose, and some people may be depressed and not even realise it, because they don’t feel sad.

How Depression is Treated.

Unlike some other illnesses, there is no single treatment for depression that works 100% of the time. The treatment plan will depend on the person and their preferences, the symptoms and how serious the depression appears to be. In general, treatment can be split into three groups:

1. Medication

There are multiple different kinds of medication that are used to treat depression and other mental illnesses, all with their own positives and negatives. Some people are nervous about taking medication because they are worried about side effects, or that the medication might take something away from their personality or ‘turn them into a zombie’, and this is understandable but may be based on some misconceptions about how some of this medication works. Some people also say that if you use medication that you are somehow masking the problem rather than dealing with the cause, and that it’s better to deal with depression ‘naturally’. Again, this is an understandable way of thinking about it, but may not be entirely accurate. The evidence suggests that medication can be a very effective way of treating or managing a mental illness, and for lots of people medication has been invaluable. There is no shame in using medication to treat depression or any other mental illness, just as there would be no shame in taking antibiotics for an infection. However, you should always talk to your doctor about any concerns that you might have prior to agreeing to try them out, and follow the instructions carefully. A general guide to the kinds of anti-depressants that are available can be found here.

2. Counselling or Talking Therapies

As I mentioned earlier, this won’t usually involve lying on a sofa and talking about your childhood (although sometimes it might!). Nowadays the main kind of therapy available on the NHS is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, or CBT for short. CBT can be delivered one-on-one or as part of a group, in person or online, and is a short term therapy designed specifically to help us to understand how we think and behave, and how these things might be connected. It is very practical, so you won’t be digging through your past or talking about previous trauma, it’s more likely that you’ll be exploring tools and techniques that can help to manage low mood as it arises. You can find more information about CBT by clicking here. Availability and access to CBT will depend on your symptoms and the area that you live in, you can always ask your GP about any local groups that you could be referred to.

You may also be encouraged to try out some mindfulness techniques, either as part of a broader course of CBT or more informally. Mindfulness encourages us to focus on our daily experiences in the moment, and spend less time worrying about the future or feeling regretful or guilty about the past. Understanding how we respond to certain triggers can help us to change those responses, although this does take patience and practise! You can find more information about mindfulness here.

More traditional talking therapy is still available, but mostly through private practise and you may need to fund it yourself.

3. Lifestyle Changes

This will generally be utilised when the depression is milder, or used in conjunction with other types of treatment. Changes to your lifestyle, whether that be improving your diet, trying to exercise more, cutting down on drugs or alcohol, considering a change in jobs or relationships or spending more time socialising can have a significant impact on mood, and can play a major role in the treatment of depression. It is likely that this process will be your responsibility, although general advice from a GP may be helpful when starting out. For some general tips about the kinds of habits that encourage good mental health, you can read one of our previous blogs here.

The evidence suggests that people may need to try several different things or a combination of different types of treatment in order to identify the most effective plan for them, and this will often take some time, but that all of these approaches are effective at treating and helping people to manage the symptoms of depression.

To summarise what we have covered today:

The causes of depression are complicated and difficult to isolate, and different people will have completely different causes and respond differently to different triggers or life events.
Depression is not just a feeling of sadness. Depression can be a very serious illness.
There is a wide variety of different symptoms caused by depression, and people will experience it in vastly different ways. The same person may even have different experiences over time.
There is no single treatment for depression, and most people will try various plans and combinations of treatments before they find the one that works for them.

If you are worried that you or someone you know may be experiencing depression or any other mental illness, you should either contact your GP or advise them to contact theirs to ask for help. If you need someone to talk to, you can contact the Samaritans for free on 116 123, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If you need immediate help or feel suicidal, you should always call 999.

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