Major Depression (Clinical Depression)

Major depression is also known as clinical depression, unipolar depression, and major depressive disorder. People who experience major depression feel persistently sad. They do not take pleasure in activities that were once enjoyable. Other physical and mental problems often experienced include sleep problems, loss of appetite, inability to concentrate, memory problems, and aches and pains.

People who suffer from this condition often feel worthless, helpless, and hopeless about their ability to fix things. They often welcome sleep and experience their waking life as a living nightmare. No matter how hard they try to snap out of it, they feel as though they are falling into an abyss with nothing to hold on to.

Major depression usually strikes people between the ages of 25 and 44, although it can affect any person at any age. For most people, episodes of major depression last from six to nine months. Sometimes, even if major depression goes untreated, it will run its course and leave by itself. Doctors are not sure why this happens, but it is often attributed to the body's tendency to correct abnormal situations.

What Causes Major Depression

The dramatic success of antidepressant drug therapy for severe major depression has made many scientists question if depression has a strong biological, rather than psychological, basis. Thus many are questioning whether genetics or stress plays the major role in causing major depression. Recent research has shown that both play a major role in major depression.

Surprisingly, stress has been shown to play a major role in the patient's first two episodes of major depression, but not in later episodes. Genetics and temperament appear to play the most important role for later episodes of a patient's depression.

It appears that major depression often requires stress to "get the ball rolling", but after a few episodes, the illness develops its own momentum and no longer needs stress to "keep rolling". This is a familiar pattern seen in many medical illnesses. Thus, the treatment of major depression must address the major contribution that stress, genetics and temperament play in this disorder. Unfortunately, most current therapies lack this well-rounded approach.
Symptoms of Major Depression (MDD)

Five (or more) of the following symptoms have been present during the same 2-week period and represent a change from previous functioning; at least one of the symptoms is either: (1) depressed mood or (2) loss of interest or pleasure. (Note: Do not include symptoms that are clearly due to a general medical condition, or mood-incongruent delusions or hallucinations.)

• depressed mood most of the day, nearly every day, as indicated by either subjective report (e.g., feels sad or empty) or observation made by others (e.g., appears tearful). Note: In children and adolescents, can be irritable mood.