Major depressive episodes and diet pills.

Author: Patten SB

Author affiliation: Departments of Community Health Sciences and Psychiatry, University of Calgary, 3330 Hospital Drive NW, Calgary, AB, Canada T2N 4N1. patten@ucalgary.ca

Publication date & source: 2002.10, Expert Opin Pharmacother., 3(10):1405-9.

Publication type: Review

A variety of medications used to assist with weight loss have been implicated in the precipitation or induction of depressive symptoms and disorders. This is true of a large number of phenylethylamine agents possessing psychostimulant properties, non-phenylethylamine psychostimulants (e.g., caffeine) and the serotonergic agent, fenfluramine. There is, as yet, no substantial evidence linking the more modern weight loss drugs, sibutramine and orlistat, to the aetiology of major depression. Nevertheless, when these drugs are used, major depression will continue to be an important clinical consideration because of the elevated frequency with which major depression occurs in obese patients, the contribution that major depression may make to poor outcomes in non-pharmacological weight loss treatment and because of the interplay between symptoms of depression and weight loss treatment.