ArticleEpidemiology and psychiatric sciences2019
Antidepressant withdrawal - the tide is finally turning.
Article in Epidemiology and psychiatric sciences, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Post-acute withdrawal syndrome (PAWS) after stopping antidepressants: a systematic review with meta-narrative synthesis.Epidemiology and psychiatric sciences · 2025Pooled it
- An assessment of the reporting of tapering methods in antidepressant discontinuation trials using the TIDieR checklist.International journal of clinical pharmacy · 2023Pooled it
- Approaches for discontinuation versus continuation of long-term antidepressant use for depressive and anxiety disorders in adults.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2021Pooled it
- Do withdrawal symptoms predict depression relapse after antidepressant cessation?European archives of psychiatry and clinical neuroscience · 2026Trial
- Article
- Antidepressant prescribing in Australian primary care: time to reevaluate.The Medical journal of Australia · 2025Article
- Article
- Antidepressants: A content analysis of healthcare providers' tweets.Exploratory research in clinical and social pharmacy · 2023Article
- Mobile phone applications to support psychotropic tapering: a scoping review protocol.HRB open research · 2022Article
- Potential Anti-Depressive Effects and Mechanisms of Zhi-Zi Hou-Po Decoction Using Behavioral Despair Tests Combined WithFrontiers in pharmacology · 2022Article
- Priorities for future research on reducing and stopping psychiatric medicines using a James Lind Alliance priority setting partnership: The PROTECT study protocol.HRB open research · 2022Article
- Long-term antidepressant use in general practice: a qualitative study of GPs' views on discontinuation.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2021Article
- Integrated Network Pharmacology Analysis and Experimental Validation to Investigate the Mechanism of Zhi-Zi-Hou-Po Decoction in Depression.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2021Article
- Prophylactic effects or withdrawal reactions? An analysis of time-to-event data from antidepressant relapse prevention trials submitted to the FDA.Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology · 2021Article
- The role of Facebook groups in the management and raising of awareness of antidepressant withdrawal: is social media filling the void left by health services?Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology · 2021Article
- How effective are antidepressants for depression over the long term? A critical review of relapse prevention trials and the issue of withdrawal confounding.Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology · 2020Review
- Protracted withdrawal syndrome after stopping antidepressants: a descriptive quantitative analysis of consumer narratives from a large internet forum.Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology · 2020Article
- May antidepressant drugs worsen the conditions they are supposed to treat? The clinical foundations of the oppositional model of tolerance.Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology · 2020Review
- Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Withdrawal reactions when coming off antidepressants have long been neglected or minimised. It took almost two decades after the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) entered the market for the first systematic review to be published. More reviews have followed, demonstrating that the dominant and long-held view that withdrawal is mostly mild, affects only a small minority and resolves spontaneously within 1-2 weeks, was at odd with the sparse but growing evidence base. What the scientific literature reveals is in close agreement with the thousands of service user testimonies available online in large forums. It suggests that withdrawal reactions are quite common, that they may last from a few weeks to several months or even longer, and that they are often severe. These findings are now increasingly acknowledged by official professional bodies and societies.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.