A systematic review 1 including 7 RCTs with a total of 700 subjects was abstracted in DARE. The patients had clinically relevant depressive symptoms but no major depressive disorder or dysthymia. The studies assessed cognitive-behaviour therapy using an adaptation of the 'Coping with Depression' course, problem-solving therapy, or interpersonal counselling. The control was treatment as usual except in one using a waiting-list control group. For depressive symptoms (6 studies) the pooled effect size for post-treatment depression outcomes was 0.42 (95% CI 0.23 to 0.60), indicating improvement in depressive symptoms for the intervention groups. Only 2 studies provided results for 6-month follow-up assessments, and 4 for 12 month assessments, no significant effect was seen at either time point. For incidence of major depressive disorder (4 studies), the pooled incident rate ratio was 0.70 (95% CI 0.47 to 1.03), indicating a reduced incidence of major depressive disorder in the intervention groups.
Primary/Secondary Keywords