Experimental depression therapy showing promise in study

BILLINGS, MONT. — By the summer of 2014, 17-year-old Timothy Bates had all but given up.

On a steady stream of depression medications since he was 14 and prone to self-harm that included cutting — “I loved my razor blades for a while,” he said — the Wyoming teen was depressed and suicidal when he was checked into Billings Clinic’s psychiatric department for a two-week stay, his second such trip in just a few months.

“I was pretty much done,” said Bates, now 19. “I had given up on all of it.”

With other methods showing little to no improvement, staff there pitched a experimental but low-risk and low-cost approach involving sleep disruption and specialized light therapy that in limited studies had shown promise in quickly reducing depressive and suicidal tendencies.

Read more: http://trib.com/news/state-and-regional/experimental-depression-therapy-showing-promise-in-study/article_f20296e5-000f-5028-9fcb-eec5f3bc26c7.html