Depression: When the Drugs Just Won’t Do It, Call in the Vitamins!

For many people struggling with depression, drugs don’t do enough. For many of those people, adding a simple vitamin may make all the difference.

Depression is all too common, and unsuccessfully treated depression is much too common too. Many depressed people do not get an adequate response to their drugs. For many of these people, simply adding a form of folate known as methylfolate may change everything.

Methylfolate is a biologically active form of folate. A just published study looked at six previous studies that added methylfolate to antidepressant drugs that had failed to sufficiently help people with depression.

Two of the studies were controlled studies, and they found that 15mg a day of methylfolate for 30 days led to a significantly greater improvement on the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale: 5.6 points versus 3.0. They also had a significantly greater response rate: 32.3% of people versus 14.6%. Response rate was defined as an improvement of at least 50% or a final score of less than 7.

An unblinded study that extended the controlled studies for a year found that 60% achieved remission and 38% recovered. That result shows that the benefits last and that people who don’t respond right away might when they are treated longer.

In a real world prospective study, 67.9% of people responded to the methylfolate and 45.7% achieved remission.

A recent discovery about depression is that inflammation plays an important role. Obesity can cause inflammation. This study found that while people with a body mass index (BMI) under 30 did not respond, those with BMI of 30 or more did. It also found that people with higher markers of inflammation experienced a significantly greater effect. These findings suggest that methylfolate may overcome the obstacle presented by obesity and inflammation to drug treatment.

Adding methylfolate was safe, causing none of the adverse reactions that are common with add on drugs.

This study suggests that methylfolate is a very safe, “very robust” treatment for people struggling with depression who are drug resistant, especially if they are overweight or have high markers of inflammation.

Prim Care Companion CNS Disord. 2023;25(3):22nr03361

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For much more on natural help for depression, see our book The Family Naturopathic Encyclopedia.

For comprehensive natural help with depression, make an appointment to see Linda Woolven now. Linda’s clinic is now open for virtual appointments.

The Natural Path is intended for educational purposes only and is in no way intended for self-diagnosis or self-treatment. For health problems, consult a qualified health practitioner for a comprehensive program.

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