Use of mood stabilizer drugs in the treatment of major depressive dissorder in an outpatient mental health center

BackgroundMajor depressive disorder (MDD) is a common and dis-abling psychiatric condition. Antidepressants are cur-rently the mainstay of treatment for depression;however, almost two thirds of patients will fail toachieve remission with initial treatment, as a result, arange of augmentation and combination strategies havebeen used [1].Materials and methodsMajor depressive disorder (MDD) is a common and dis-abling psychiatric condition. Antidepressants are cur-rently the mainstay of treatment for depression;however, almost two thirds of patients will fail toachieve remission with initial treatment, as a result, arange of augmentation and combination strategies havebeen used [1].ResultsMood stabilizers are used in 14% of the sample with apredominancy in the female gender (85.7%), a globalaverage age 50.6 ± 12.2 years. Regarding personal psy-chiatric background, there’s an absence of these in thefirst place (64.3%), followed by the presence of previousdepressive episodes (21.4%) and dysthymic disorder(7.1%). In none of these cases there was toxic abuse.There is a predominancy in the absence of previouspsychiatric hospitalisations (64.3%).The frequencies of use of mood stabilizers was: topira-mate in the first place (50%) followed by lithium, carba-mazepine and pregabaline (14.28% each of them), in thelast place lamotrigine (7.1%). The average dose was900 mg/d for carbamazepine, 600 mg/d for lithium,300 mg/d for pregabaline,128.5 mg/d for topiramateand 100 mg/d for lamotrigine.ConclusionsIn our sample the frequency of use of lithium is similarto the registered for the several antiepiletics (lithium,carbamazepine and pregabaline: 14.28% each one). How-ever, lithium addition is recommended as a first choicefor depressed patients who do not respond to therapywith conventional antidepressants [2].