Support to reduce the symptoms of depression, offers the promise of

Support offers the promise of powerful and affordable tool to combat depression, a new study of the VA Ann Arbor health care system and the University of Michigan health system finds.

Where patients and volunteers to share information in order to reduce the number of programs found in the depression better than traditional care alone and was about as effective as a cognitive-behavioral therapy, after analysing the 10 year 1987 at random from the trials of the 2009 depression support interventions to researchers for the peer.

The analysis was the first of its kind, in particular, depression, peer support, says the chief author of the behold, Paul Pfeiffer, M.D., Associate Professor m.s. from the University of Michigan medical school and VA Ann Arbor health care system, researcher at the Department of Psychiatry.

"Peer support is much less likely to depression than other conditions such as alcohol or drug treatment partly" Pfeiffer says. "Our study combined data from a small experiments at random and found support seems to be equally effective in treating depression, some of the more traditional treatments."

The findings were published recently online in advance of General Hospital Psychiatry print publication.

Support has been found to reduce isolation, reduce stress, improve health information sharing and provide role models, in the course of the investigation.

Since the aid programs often uses volunteers and nonprofessionals and the phone or via the Internet, you can do very well, he is the person the opportunity to be widely available in a relatively low cost, Pfeiffer says.

The need for additional carrying options, it is important, when you think of that one-third of patients with anti-depressants further experience significant depression problems after trying to four medicines and more than half of the people who achieve their symptoms of relapse within one year from the date of cancellation, he adds.

"As a field, we should take a look at the peer support and integration of parts of the primary care specialty, depression," Pfeiffer says, noting that More and more studies may also provide additional information.

Funding: This research was supported in VA health services research and Development Service, Michigan diabetes research and Training Center, and the Michigan Institute for clinical and health research.

Add U M authors: Michele Heisler, M.D., John d. Piette, Ph.d., Mary A. M. Rogers, Ph.d., M.D., and Marcia Valenstein, Heisler, Piette and Valenstein are VA appointments.

Reference: "depression: the effectiveness of the interventions of the peer support for meta-analysis" of General Hospital Psychiatry. DOI: 10.1016/j. genhosppsych. 2010 10.002

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