How Do Antidepressants Work

In the 1950's the discovery of two new drugs sparked what would become a multibillion dollar market for antidepressants. Neither the drug was intended to treat depression at all. In fact, at the time, many doctors and scientists believed psychotherapy was the only approach to treating depression. The decades long journey of discovery that followed revolutionized our understanding of depression and raised questions we hadn't considered before. One of those first two antidepressant drugs was Iproniazid, which was intented to treat tuberculosis. In the 1952 trial it not only treated tuberculosis it also improved the moods of patients who had been diagnosed with depression. In the 1956 a Swiss clinician observed a similar effect when running a trial for imipramine a drug for allergic reactions. both drugs affected a class of neurotransmitters called monoamines. The discovery of these antidepressant drugs gave rise to the chemical imbalance theory the idea that depression is caused by having insufficient monoamines in the brains synapses.