Psychopharmacologic treatment of depression.

The authors emphasize the favorable response of most patients with major depression to appropriate pharmacotherapy, and present a decision-tree approach to the pharmacotherapy of major depression. Also discussed are use of contemporary clinical nosology and neuroendocrine diagnostic tests to identify candidates for pharmacotherapy and/or ECT, use of secondary tricyclics because of their lower incidence of side-effects, monitoring plasma levels of antidepressants to achieve therapeutic levels, and potentiating tricyclic nonresponders with T3 or lithium.