Pharmacotherapy of adolescent depression - fluoxetine monotherapy or combined treatment?

Abstract

Depressive disorder is one of the most common and serious psychiatric diagnosis in paediatric population, often connected with suicidal risk. In recent years, fluoxetine monotherapy is the gold standard in acute phase of depression treatment in children and adolescents, but is not effective enough after an acute phase of treatment. More helpful researches concerning more effective therapeutic strategies of depression in this age are insufficient. The aim of our study is to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of fluoxetine monotherapy in comparison with combined olanzapine/fluoxetine therapy in acute 6-week treatment of depression in adolescence. We found that combined therapeutic strategy, using olanzapine augmentation is predicted to be more useful in the treatment of adolescent depression.