Source: Heart  |  Posted 8 years ago

Cognitive behaviour therapy is the most well researched form of psychological treatment for non-psychotic unipolar depression, but whether this type of therapy is more effective than other types of non-pharmacological therapy remains unclear.

So far, the efficacy of cognitive behavior therapy has been evaluated only in heterogeneous groups of depressed patients. According to Gordon Parker, MD, PhD, from the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, and colleagues, studying heterogeneous groups is only appropriate when a treatment is effective for all expressions of depression.

The researchers reviewed original studies and quantitative analyses on the use of cognitive behavior therapy for depression. They found that claims for cognitive behavior therapy's efficacy on depression have been overstated. They also question whether its efficacy fits within the theoretical underpinnings of cognitive behavior therapy and argue against viewing it as a universal rather than a targeted strategy.

According to the researchers, cognitive behavior therapy may indeed be of equivalent efficacy to other treatments, "but it has a higher cachet because of extensive scientific evaluation and its credibility to patients and practitioners as a rational and logical approach."

They also point out that cognitive behavior therapy is like other treatment strategies in that it provides varying degrees of benefit for different types of depression "with the most appropriate primary and secondary treatment niches yet to be defined."

"The current treatment model for depression lacks 'horse sense' in encouraging the view that any therapeutic modality should be universal rather than targeted," Dr. Parker and colleagues conclude. "It is likely that cognitive behavior therapy (like other treatments) has specific benefits both as a primary treatment and as an adjunctive treatment for certain subsets of depressed patients," they add.