Those of you who have a history of depression: were other physical ailments ruled out before you were diagnosed?

I was diagnosed with depression and no, they didn’t even check for anything physical. I think they should though.

I would hope they would do a full fledged physical, blood tests, everything to rule out the physical causes first before ever going to a depression diagnosis. Anything else would be lousy care.

@Adirondackwannabe thats’s all you get for mental health in the UK. A two-minute appointment and a bottle of pills.

I told the doctor I wanted to try an antidepressant and he just wrote me a script.

Years later, I just stopped taking it. No marked difference.

I agree that other options should be explored first.

@downtide So much for the single payer system. I have some excellent doctors but the insurance isn’t cheap.

I was discussing this with a friend the other day and I more think it’s to do with an age-old British culture, which thinks that mental illness requires nothing more than a stiff upper lip and a nice cup of tea. The NHS works well for anything physical but as soon as mental health is mentioned, nobody wants to know. But that’s not the fault of the system, its the fault of a culture that sees mental health care as being un-necessary and irrelevant.

That’s an unhealthy attitude. The brain is just like any other organ, it can get sick too.

I think this is a very valid question to ask. It is one of those “chicken or the egg” questions.

Are you depressed because you are physically inactive or are you physically inactive because you are depressed? Getting the correct answer can make the difference in both the treatment and the outcome.

I was frustrated when I got diagnosed with depression because I was tired all the time—and felt more tired the more I slept. It was a decade before someone suggested I get a sleep test. I had moderate sleep apnea and needed a cpap machine to get a decent nights’ sleep. I think the anti-depressants helped somewhat with feeling down, but the cpap machine helped a heck of a lot more.

Unfortunately, doctors will give out the antidepressants before they rule out other conditions here. Many people have thyroid disease and don’t know it. Depression is one of the major symptoms of hypothyroid and hypomania is one of the major symptoms of hyperthyroid.

It’s cheaper to just give an antidepressant than to do all the tests. Many insurance companies don’t even cover exploratory tests at all. Also, depression is more common than many of these disorders. So in the long run, it’s probably a safer bet to pass out the Prozac and wait to see if other symptoms manifest later.

@rojo just to be clear, I’m not talking about “physical inactivity.” I work out 5 days a week and I have for a very long time. But unlike most people, I don’t feel energized or rejuvenated after exercise, I am much more likely to require a lot of extra sleep and rest on days that I exercise. When a person is “depressed,” exercise should help. But a person with secondary fatigue (or even someone with something like chronic fatigue syndrome) might not feel better with exercise, in fact it might make them feel worse. Doctors should (hopefully??) know this, but I have never even had a doctor ask.

@keobooks that’s perfect example of what I mean. I do believe I was depressed, I believe that I get depressed and I struggle with depression. But I think that the physical issue (mine being fatigue from stage IV endometriosis and frozen pelvis) exacerbated it, because naturally it didn’t respond to depression treatment. I’m inclined to agree with everything you’ve said. It sure seems that way, but you want to hope that doctors don’t really do that sort of thing.