Yes, the dramatic turn around demonstrated by that patient is pretty unusual. It was interesting that she always wore a "burqa-like garment" (I don't remember the correct name of the garment --- she is East Indian), but when I saw her last week she was dressed in very nice street clothes and looked radiant, so the change was VERY visible. This type of turn around is VERY unusual, but it can happen.........
I'd like to make a clarification about the type of treatment this patient had because I know there are a lot of people who follow your thread. I think that this patient's turn around should be attributed to a combination of psychotherapy AND drug therapy. In my experience, drugs prescribed by psychiatrists in the absence of psychotherapy by Ph.D. psychologists will have limited success. Certain types of depression respond best to anti-depressants and other types of related mental health disorders (i.e. PTSD) respond best to psychotherapy.
In the clinic where I work, I see a lot of patients come in having been prescribed antidepressants by family practice physicians. If someone has significant depression or mental health problems, this is not an effective approach. Those people should be seeing mental health specialists.
Hope this helps someone out there........and Mila, sorry for the hijack.
