GENES, ANTIDEPRESSANTS, AND THE HARD SELL.

How does your doctor decide which antidepressant to prescribe? Has yours ever ordered a genetic screening before writing a 'script? Mine didn't.

A Korean study just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that the condition of particular genes in seriously depressed patients apparently determined which antidepressants were effective in those patients. There was good reason to do this study. According to the study, 30% to 40% of initial depression treatment choices fail. If you want to wade through a little technical language, here's the University of Pennsylvania's MedPage report on the study -- I think it's readable, though it's meant for docs.

So, what'll it be? Cymbalta? Zoloft? Prozac? Celexa? Is your doc deciding based on who's selling her the hardest? Are you pushing for the one whose commercial music captivates you?

We could, I suppose, muscle our legislators to drain the FDA-Pharma multibillion-dollar drug marketing swamp. We could pressure our doctors to wake up and smell the hype, and be a little less quick with the prescription pad. But, in the short run, and the long, for that matter, the enemy is us. Wise up. Just say no to drug ads.