The Journal of the Arkansas Medical Society Issue 4 Volume 115 | Page 15

tinuation may accelerate the symptoms of other dis-
orders. However, there are no treatment studies in
youth, so information about which patient requires
maintenance or continuation treatment is limited. 7
In a real world experience, Bockting et al. ex-
amined the discontinuation rate of maintenance an-
tidepressants in daily clinical practice in recurrently
depressed patients and the associated risk of recur-
rence. 8 Prospectively, antidepressant maintenance
medication and recurrence were examined in 172
euthymic patients with recurrent depression. Patient
profiles before recurrence (nonusers, intermittent
users, continuous users) were examined and related
to recurrence over a two-year follow-up period. They
found that despite continuous use of antidepressant
in 42% of their study population, 60.4% of them re-
lapse