ABSTRACT
Drug administration together with psychotherapy is known to be essential for treating conditions such as schizophrenia, some types of depression, mania, and some anxiety states. Many of the commonly prescribed antidepressant drugs are called SSRIs because they selectively inhibit the re-uptake of serotonin, thus making it more available to the brain. The surest indicator for the future prospects of psychiatric drug developments, particularly in the field of antidepressants, is the degree of research investment that drug companies are prepared to make. For patients with profound, unremitting depression, suicide is a serious risk and hospitalisation together with drug treatment, caring therapy, and perhaps electroconvulsive therapy may improve matters. Psychotherapy can help patients to make some sense of the unwelcome intrusions from their disordered brains that cause so much distress. Patients can be helped to understand the nature of their delusionary thoughts and come to see them as misfiring neural circuits, thus reframing them, not as madness but as illness.
