Reading path

Reading Mental-Health Evidence With a Clear Eye

This path builds the skills to interpret psychiatry and psychology evidence, from what a symptom questionnaire really measures to how antidepressant trials handle placebo, effect size, and comparison. It is for readers who want to judge claims about depression and anxiety treatments fairly, without either dismissing or overselling them.

The path, step by step

1. 1 What the GAD-7 Measures, and Why a High Score Is Not a Diagnosis

   4 min read

   Start where assessment starts, understanding that a common anxiety questionnaire is a severity gauge, not a diagnosis.

2. 2 How Depression Rating Scales Are Scored and Why the Cutoffs Are Debated

   5 min read

   Next learn how the rating scales that serve as trial outcomes are scored, since every effect estimate rests on them.

3. 3 How the USPSTF Built Its Adult Depression Screening Recommendation

   5 min read

   See how a screening recommendation is assembled from evidence, connecting measurement tools to population-level policy.

4. 4 Why Placebo Response Is So Large in Depression Trials

   5 min read

   Confront the large placebo response that shapes every psychiatry trial before interpreting any drug effect.

5. 5 How to Read Antidepressant Effect Sizes Without Overclaiming

   4 min read

   With placebo in view, learn to read the magnitude of an antidepressant effect rather than just whether it is significant.

6. 6 The Myth That Antidepressants Do Nothing for the First Few Weeks

   4 min read

   Apply that lens to the time course, correcting a common misreading of how quickly these drugs act.

7. 7 How a Network Meta-Analysis Ranks 21 Antidepressants

   4 min read

   Scale up to comparison by seeing how a network meta-analysis ranks many drugs at once, and what such rankings can and cannot say.

8. 8 Therapy, Medication, or Both for Depression: Reading the Comparative Evidence

   4 min read

   Compare across modalities, weighing therapy against medication using effect sizes and number needed to treat.

9. 9 Exercise for Depression: How Strong Is the Evidence Really?

   4 min read

   Test your appraisal on a popular adjunct, where blinding limits mean the evidence supports a supporting role rather than a cure.

10. 10 The Pharmacology of Coming Off an Antidepressant Slowly

    4 min read

    End with the pharmacology of stopping, closing the treatment arc with how the drugs are safely withdrawn.

Each step is a full article on the Reading the Evidence blog.

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