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Saving Lives in New York Volume 2: Approaches and Special Populations
The following shows that this ‘usage gender
gap’ holds true across the lifespan:
Figure 7.
Antidepressant Prescription Usage
by Gender.
Figure 8.
SSRI antidepressant drug visits
among adults 18 years of age
and over by sex: United States,
1995-2002.
The ‘gender gap’ in antidepressant usage
has grown in recent years, as SSRI’s have
come to dominate the market of prescribed
medications for depressive disorders.
Inadequate treatment for depression is not
confined to New York or to the male population.
Evidence indicates that primary care
physicians tend to under-recognize and
under-treat mood disorders in general.
(IOM: 2002) Even when properly diagnosed,
one recent study published in the
Archives of Internal Medicine found that
many depressed people were not receiving
the care they need. While prescribing antidepressants
remains a sound course of
treatment, many doctors failed to appropriately
monitor their patients, many of whom
did not feel better after weeks and months
of drug therapy. Previous research has
found that appropriate diagnosis and quality
care are lagging in the primary care setting.
A lack of resources and time, reluctance
on the part of primary care physicians
to screen for depression, and unfamiliarity
with how to administer drugs for
depression are some of the reasons for this
“treatment gap.” (Altan: 2004)
This inadequate treatment results in a phenomenon
known as “presenteeism” whereby
people show up for work but are largely
unproductive because they are depressed.
This problem could stem from the lack of
96 Men in the Middle Years