Short Course: Talking therapy may treat depression

Talking therapy may treat depression

LONDON: Patients with depression who fail to benefit from anti-depressant drugs may do better if they are also treated with a type of "talking" psychotherapy called CBT, according to new research published last Friday. In the first large-scale trial to test the effectiveness of cognitive behavioural therapy, or CBT, alongside medication for depression, scientists said they found that the combination works where drug treatment alone fails.

Nicola Wiles of Bristol University's school of social and community medicine, who led the study, said the findings underline the need to increase the availability of therapy for depressed patients. "While there have been initiatives to increase access to CBT in both the UK and Australia, worldwide initiatives are rare," she said in a statement. Wiles and colleagues recruited 469 adults from across Britain who had not responded to at least 6 weeks of treatment with an antidepressant.

Study raises questions on coating of aspirin

NEW YORK: While aspirin may prevent heart attacks and strokes, a commonly used coating to protect the stomach may obscure the benefits, leading doctors to prescribe more expensive prescription drugs, according to a study published Tuesday in the journal Circulation. The conclusion about coated aspirin was only one finding in the study, whose main goal was to test the hotly disputed idea that aspirin does not help prevent heart attacks or stroke in some people.

For more than a decade, cardiologists and drug researchers have posited that anywhere from 5 to 40 percent of the population is "aspirin resistant," as the debated condition is known. Some doctors say that the prevalence of the condition has been exaggerated by companies and drug makers with a commercial interest in proving that aspirin does not always work. The study was partly financed by Bayer, the world's largest manufacturer of brand-name aspirin, much of which is coated.

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