In light of the recent concern over a potential link between antidepressants and suicide in children and adolescents, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will now conduct a study on the risks to adults.
The FDA previously found no increased risk of suicide in adults but will now reexamine existing data on adult clinical trials in the same detailed fashion it used for analysis in the young. On October 15, the FDA said it was ordering manufacturers to add a "black box" warning to the packaging information of all antidepressants about the potential risk of increased suicidal tendencies in children and adolescents.
Considerably more data are available concerning adults and antidepressants than exist for children and adolescents. The agency has more than 200 randomized trials for 20 drugs compared with 23 pediatric trials.
Information from the FDA on antidepressant use can be found at http://www.fda.gov/cder/drug/antidepressants/default.htm.
