Dysmorphophobia is the tendency to greatly exaggerate the flaws in one’s appearance. It happens that the disease forces a person to undergo plastic surgery that does not bring relief. You can fight this mental disorder with the help of antidepressants.
Body dysmorphic disorder affects approximately 3% of the US population and is equally common in men and women. Because of this disorder, people are prone to depression and even try to commit suicide.
For the treatment of body dysmorphophobia, both psychotherapy (especially cognitive-behavioral therapy) and antidepressant therapy – selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are used. However, until recently, the effectiveness of antidepressants in the treatment of body dysmorphic disorder has been proven only in the short term.
American doctors decided to find out whether antidepressants retain their effectiveness with longer treatment. They conducted a study that initially included 100 adults with body dysmorphic disorder.1.
At the first stage, all participants took an antidepressant for 14 weeks, then the researchers selected 58 patients for the second stage, for whom the drug was most effective.
Their symptoms of the disorder were significantly reduced, their general mental state and quality of life improved.
They were divided into two groups, one of which continued to take the medicine, and the second group was transferred to a placebo (“dummy”). The second phase of the study continued for another 6 months.
The antidepressant was more effective than placebo – within six months, the symptoms of the disorder returned in 40% of patients in the placebo group and only in 18% of those who continued to take escitalopram.
“Dysmorphophobia is a fairly common disorder, often chronic, which, unfortunately, has not yet been sufficiently studied. Our results showed that continuing drug treatment after initial improvement in the patient’s condition significantly reduces the risk of relapse and can sometimes provide an even greater therapeutic effect, ”says one of the study authors, MD, director of the body dysmorphophobia treatment program at the Rhode Island Hospital (USA) Catherine Phillips.
In the future, the scientists plan to find out how effective cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy is in preventing recurrence of the disease after drug treatment is stopped.
1 K. Philips et al. «Pharmacotherapy Relapse Prevention in Body Dysmorphic Disorder: A Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial», The American Journal of Psychiatry.