Cognitive therapy (CT), a form of talk therapy, works as well as antidepressants in mild to severely depressed patients. University of Pennsylvania researchers published this conclusion of a major study in the Archives of General Psychiatry in April 2005.
Researchers found that cognitive therapy, a type of treatment that teaches patients to think more realistically, worked as well as a popular antidepressant for moderate to severe depression. The research was funded by a $4 million grant from the National Institutes of Health.
Patients who got four months of cognitive therapy also had about the same relapse rate a year later as people who took Paxil (paroxetine) the whole time. If people quit taking Paxil after four months, their relapse rate was twice that of therapy patients.
This study follows another recent study that confirmed patients ending CT were significantly less likely to relapse than patients ending medications.
Cognitive Therapy Is Less Expensive than Antidepressants
The researchers, from Penn and Vanderbilt Universities, contend that cognitive therapy is also cheaper than antidepressants in the long run. They argued that the American Psychiatric Association should change its treatment guidelines for moderate to severe depression, which currently calls for antidepressants as the standard first treatment.
The research adds to a growing body of evidence that this type of therapy works as well as drugs. The study is important because of its size and because it tested therapy in moderately and severely depressed patients, a group where previous results have been controversial.
Cognitive Therapy was developed in Philadelphia by the University of Pennsylvania's Aaron Beck. This study "establishes once and for all that cognitive therapy does as well as pharmacotherapy, and what's even more important is that it has a much lower relapse rate," said Beck.
In cognitive therapy, depressed patients typically practice thinking about how realistic their habitually negative ideas really are. The ultimate goal is that people will be able to be their own therapists.
Other researchers have since applied CT to a wide range of psychological problems so that now cognitive therapy the most scientifically studied talk therapy. The approach is commonly combined with Behavior Therapy, which is designed to disrupt dysfunctional behaviors. Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy is used by up to 30% of therapists.
Some studies even conclude that CT is more effective than medication. However, as one psychologist put it, "drugs are easier... and they are much more easily available."
