A ground-breaking study involving researchers from the University, and published in the October issue of World Psychiatry, is providing important evidence of the efficacy of long term psychoanalytic psychotherapy (LTPP) for NHS patients suffering from chronic depression.

Conducted by University partner the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Mental Health Trust, the Tavistock Adult Depression Study (TADS) is the first randomised controlled trial in the NHS to establish if this type of psychotherapy can provide relief for those not helped by the treatments currently provided: antidepressants, short-term courses of counselling or cognitive behavioural therapy.

Crucially, the study, which started more than 10 years ago, followed participants for two-years post-intervention to look at long-term therapeutic effects. It found nearly half of patients still saw major improvements two years after therapy had ended.

The trial’s original Principal Investigator was Professor Phil Richardson, from the School of Health and Human Sciences at the University, who sadly died in 2007, and Senior Lecturer Dr Susan McPherson co-authored the research report.

This kind of depression is a major mental health problem: as many as one in five people who have an episode of depression will suffer a chronic form; the quality of life associated with some of these conditions is similar to that of people suffering from advanced metastatic cancer; suicide rates are high.

The Tavistock Adult Depression Study found that:

• 44% of the patients who were given 18 months of weekly psychoanalytic psychotherapy no longer have major depressive disorder when followed up two years after therapy had ended; for those receiving the NHS treatments currently provided the figure was only 10%.
• Whilst just 14% of those receiving the psychoanalytic psychotherapy had recovered completely, full recovery occurred in only 4% of those receiving the treatments currently employed.
• In every 6-months period of the trial’s exceptional 3 ½ years of observation of participants, the chances of going into partial remission for those receiving psychoanalytic psychotherapy were 40% higher than for those who were receiving the usual treatments.
• After two years of follow-up, depressive symptoms had partially remitted in 30% of those receiving the psychoanalytic therapy; in the control condition this figure was again only 4%.
• Those receiving the psychoanalytic psychotherapy also saw significantly more benefits to their quality of life, general wellbeing and social and personal functioning.
• Some patients did not benefit. Research is ongoing to identify the reasons underlying the differences in responsiveness.

TADS Clinical Director, Dr David Taylor, from the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust said: “These findings point to the value of a whole person approach in patients who have complex or persistent problems with depression. Longer-term psychoanalytic psychotherapy involves the shared commitment of patient and therapist to understanding emotionally painful parts of a depressed person’s life. This may activate a beneficial process of psychological growth with a lasting gain in resilience. This can occur even in those who have had their disorder for many years, have not responded to other treatments and who previously may not have been thought to benefit from psychoanalytic psychotherapy.”