Complications

Depression is a serious illness that can take a terrible toll on individuals and families. Untreated, depression can lead to a downward spiral of disability, dependency and suicide. Depression can result in severe emotional, behavioral, health and even legal and financial problems that affect every area of your life. Complications that depression may cause or be associated with include:

• Suicide
• Alcohol abuse
• Substance abuse
• Anxiety
• Heart disease and other HeartCare-Info conditions
• Work or school problems
• Family conflicts
• Relationship difficulties
• Social isolation

Treatments and drugs

Numerous treatments for depression are available. Standard depression treatment options include:

• Medications
• Psychotherapy
• Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT)

Emerging and less-studied treatments for depression include:

• Brain stimulation
• Complementary and alternative treatments

In some cases, your primary care doctor can treat your depression. In other cases, you may benefit from treatment with a qualified mental health provider, such as a psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker.

Try to be an active participant in your depression treatment. Working together, you and your doctor or therapist can decide which treatment options may be best for your situation, depending on your symptoms and their severity, your personal preferences, insurance coverage, affordability, treatment side effects and other factors. In some cases, though, depression is so severe that a doctor, loved one or guardian may need to guide your care until you're well enough to participate in decision making.

Here's a closer look at your depression treatment options.

Medications
Dozens of medications are available to treat depression. Most people find the best relief of depression symptoms by combining medications and psychotherapy. Some medications for depression are antidepressants that have been specifically approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat depression. Doctors also can use their HeartCare-Info judgment to prescribe other medications that haven't been FDA approved to treat depression but that may be effective anyway — a common and perfectly legal practice called off-label use.

There are several different types of antidepressants. Antidepressants are generally categorized by how they affect the naturally occurring biochemicals in your brain to change your mood. To determine which antidepressant may be best for you, doctors typically follow general practice guidelines. They may also ask you to take a blood test called the cytochrome P450 test, which can help identify genetic factors that influence your response to certain antidepressants (as well as some other medications).