In the case of antidepressants, it has been seen that one out of three people with a major depressive disease does not experience improvement even after taking sequential courses of antidepressants and develop treatment-resistant depression. Multiple acute-phase studies have shown the effectiveness of antipsychotics in the improvement of depressive symptoms but the clinical improvement that is remission remains limited, and also there are significant side effects when using these medications for a long time. Pragmatic clinical trials are needed to see the effectiveness of atypical antipsychotics with treatment-resistant depression.
This suggests that while using antipsychotics clinicians and patients should use a shared decision-making approach by personalizing treatment selection based on tolerability, anticipated side effects, feasibility, and cost.
