A new review of antidepressants makes a useful point about long-term treatment: effectiveness is only part of the question. Whether people can stay with a medicine also matters, which makes the findings relevant to treatment discussions but unsuitable as a universal prescribing rule.
According to Der Spiegel, a team led by Henricus Ruhé and Paul van Haaren at Radboud University Medical Center screened 54,231 reports and selected 115 studies involving 30,428 participants. The review, published in The Lancet Psychiatry, assessed longer-term effectiveness and patient acceptability, using fluoxetine as its reference medicine.
Escitalopram, duloxetine and agomelatine performed particularly well in longer treatment, the report says. People taking escitalopram and duloxetine also stopped treatment less often than those taking fluoxetine. That outcome deserves attention: a medicine’s longer-term value depends not only on symptom relief, but on whether treatment can realistically continue.
But the sound editorial conclusion is not that these drugs should become default choices. Ruhé said, as reported by Der Spiegel, that clinicians weigh benefit against side effects and that balance differs from person to person. The supplied report does not provide effect sizes, confidence intervals, side-effect comparisons or results broken down by depression severity, coexisting conditions or previous treatment.
The review therefore offers a better framework for a clinical conversation, rather than a league table for self-selection: which option may fit a person’s circumstances while supporting sustained care? It cannot answer that question alone. Der Spiegel also notes an older review finding that psychotherapy alone, and psychotherapy combined with antidepressants, had a higher likelihood of lasting effectiveness than antidepressants alone.
Sources
- Der Spiegel · Source date: 2026-11-11
Independent editorial content. WUA is not affiliated with any political party. 2026-11-11