Background: Developers of clinical practice guidelines need to take patient values and preferences into consideration when weighing benefits and harms of treatment options for depressive disorder.
Purpose: To assess patient values and preferences regarding pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic treatments of depressive disorder.
Data sources: MEDLINE (Ovid) and PsycINFO (EBSCO) were searched for eligible studies published from 1 January 2014 to 30 November 2022.
Study selection: Pairs of reviewers independently screened 30% of search results. The remaining 70% of the abstracts were screened by single reviewers; excluded abstracts were checked by a second reviewer. Pairs of reviewers independently screened full texts.
Data extraction: One reviewer extracted data and assessed the certainty of evidence, and a second reviewer checked for completeness and accuracy. Two reviewers independently assessed risk of bias.
Data synthesis: The review included 11 studies: 4 randomized controlled trials, 5 cross-sectional studies, and 2 qualitative studies. In 1 randomized controlled trial, participants reported at the start of therapy that they expected supportive-expressive psychotherapy and antidepressants to yield similar improvements. A cross-sectional study reported that non-Hispanic White participants and men generally preferred antidepressants over talk therapy, whereas Hispanic and non-Hispanic Black participants and women generally did not have a preference. Another cross-sectional study reported that the most important nonserious adverse events for patients treated with antidepressants were insomnia, anxiety, fatigue, weight gain, agitation, and sexual dysfunction. For other comparisons and outcomes, no conclusions could be drawn because of the insufficient certainty of evidence.
Limitations: The main limitation of this review is the low or insufficient certainty of evidence for most outcomes. No evidence was available on second-step depression treatment or differences in values and preferences based on gender, race/ethnicity, age, and depression severity.
Conclusion: Low-certainty evidence suggests that there may be some differences in preferences for talk therapy or pharmacologic treatment of depressive disorders based on gender or race/ethnicity. In addition, low-certainty evidence suggests that insomnia, anxiety, fatigue, weight gain, agitation, and sexual dysfunction may be the most important nonserious adverse events for patients treated with antidepressants. Evidence is lacking or insufficient to draw any further conclusions about patients' weighing or valuation of the benefits and harms of depression treatments.
Primary funding source: American College of Physicians. (PROSPERO: CRD42020212442).