Are Clinicians Overprescribing Antidepressants to Women?

A particular magazine headline grabbed my attention this summer:  “Good Mood or Good Sex:  Do Women Have to Choose?”  As a psychiatry resident, I think and talk about psychiatric medications on a daily basis. So while I’m well-versed in psychiatry from a clinician’s perspective, I’m also interested in how our field is portrayed by the lay press. Piqued by the cover, I bought the July issue of Vogue to find out more.

The Vogue article addresses, in addition to other things, the high prevalence of antidepressant use among women in the United States. Twenty-three percent of women in their forties and fifties take antidepressants, as do 21% of women over 20 and 11% of all Americans over age 11. What gives? Are psychiatrists and primary care physicians too quick to prescribe antidepressants?  Are women too casual about taking them?  Both may be true.  However, I wonder if the myriad demands faced by women today are also playing a role in this trend. 

Though gender roles continue to evolve, women in two-income households in the U.S. still perform more of the housework and enjoy less free time than their spouses, hour for hour. They are also likely to do more “emotional work,” a less quantifiable but energy-intensive function that includes tasks such as tending to the emotional well being of family members. On the other hand, women who choose to stay home or remain childless may face painful derision from peers.

I was glad to see the author of this piece conclude by challenging readers to consider the root causes of their depression. As a psychiatrist, I must meet patients where they are, and it helps if they are already willing to take a multifactorial approach to improving their mental health.

What are your thoughts about the high prevalence of antidepressant use in the U.S., especially in women? How do you balance your role as a psychopharmacologist with your desire to help patients improve the bigger picture of their lives?

Leigh Jennings, MD, is a senior psychiatry resident in the Department of Neurology and Psychiatry at Saint Louis University School of Medicine.

The views expressed on this blog are solely those of the blog post author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Psych Congress Network or other Psych Congress Network authors.