You Might Feel Blue, but New Study Says Too Many Are Diagnosed With Depression

April 3, 2007 — -- It is widely estimated that more than 30 million Americans will suffer from depression at least once in their lives, but a new study finds one out of every four people told they have depression could, in fact, be reacting normally to some of life's more troubling times.

"It's normal to be sad after a spouse dies. We're arguing that it's also normal to be sad after another terrible thing happens, like you lose your job or you get divorced," said Dr. Michael First, of Columbia University, a researcher who participated in the study.

Right now, such hardships are not considered when a patient's mental health is evaluated.

Hundreds of thousands of medical professionals use the same checklist issued by the American Psychiatric Association to diagnose patients with clinical depression and ask them: Are you depressed, do you have a lack of interest, loss of appetite, trouble sleeping. Are you lethargic, and do you experience fatigue, guilt, a lack of concentration or suicidal thoughts?

If patients suffer from five or more of the symptoms, they are diagnosed as clinically depressed.

The researchers pored over thousands of those checklists and found that of those who would have been labeled depressed, one in four were dealing with the kind of loss that would make anyone sad.

So does that mean they were diagnosed incorrectly? First said, "Absolutely. Absolutely a possibility."

Which means their treatment might be incorrect -- all questions Kathy Anderson asks every day. She is now a counselor at the Center for Loss and Life Transition.

She responded to the death of her son by reaching out to others who are grieving -- people she believes are too quickly labeled clinically depressed.

"I think its such a prevalent term that its almost expected that we be depressed," Anderson said.

Still, many doctors said the checklist, though too simple and too broad, helps more than it hurts.

Arguing whether patients are labeled clinically depressed --