Guideline, 2001
What is the best treatment for PMDD and depression in women?
For severe PMDD symptoms, doctors recommend antidepressant medication combined with therapy. For mild symptoms, therapy alone or lifestyle approaches may work as well or better than medication.
What they did
Expert consensus study. Thirty-six leading doctors (90% of those invited) reviewed evidence and rated 858 treatment options for four conditions: PMDD, depression in pregnancy, postpartum depression in breastfeeding women, and perimenopause or menopause depression.
What they found
Experts reached consensus on 76% of treatment options. For severe symptoms in all four conditions, the first-line recommendation was antidepressant medication combined with other modalities (generally psychotherapy). For milder symptoms, experts sometimes gave equal endorsement to other treatment modalities such as nutritional or psychobehavioral approaches (in PMDD), hormone replacement (in perimenopause), or preferred psychotherapy over medication. In all mild cases, antidepressants were recommended as at least a second-line option.
What it means for you
Treatment should match symptom severity. Severe PMDD warrants medication plus therapy. For mild symptoms, you may have other options including therapy and lifestyle changes before trying medication. This is expert opinion, not based on new research trials.
36
expert doctors who participated
858
treatment options rated
76%
consensus reached on options
About the study
- Original title
- The Expert Consensus Guideline Series. Treatment of depression in women
- Authors
- Altshuler LL, Cohen LS, Moline ML et al.
- Journal
- Postgraduate medicine
- Year
- 2001
- Study design
- Guideline
- What was tested
- Various treatments: antidepressants, psychotherapy, nutritional approaches, hormone replacement
- Read the paper
- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11500997/
Topics
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