medications for depression.
Currently the most popular and widely used medication for depression is SSRI's. These drugs seek to make the brain produce and respond to more serotonin. They have proven very affective, and are usually the first step in treatment.
Recent studies have shown that these drugs can show signs of improvement in a patient as early as the first week.
psychotherapy.
While drugs are becoming the norm for treating depression, there are also other ways to treat the illness without drugs - or in a combination of drugs and therapy.
Therapy seeks to alter the way in which a patient lives, altering habits and problems that may have been the root of the depression from the beginning.
Because it tackles the core of the problem, therapy is seen as one of the better ways to treat depression - however it can be more time consuming and costly than its pharmaceutical counterpart.
