Prescribing for moderate or severe unipolar depression in patients under the long-term care of UK adult mental health services.

Patients with moderate or severe depression remaining under the care of a CMHT for longer than a year are clinically complex. The failure to achieve a level of wellness allowing discharge from mental health services may be partly related to the finding that not all patients had the benefit of a systematic approach to clinical assessment and sequential testing of available evidence-based pharmacological interventions.