Effect of short-term antidepressant treatment on early maladaptive schemas in patients with major depressive and panic disorder.

Objective: We aimed to investigate the effect of anti-depressant treatment on early maladaptive schemas (EMSs).

Methods: Eighty patients were self-referred to a psychiatric outpatient clinic and were diagnosed with major depressive disorder (MDD) (n = 40) and panic disorder (PD) (n = 40) according to the criteria of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition (DSM-IV-TR). These patients were administered the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) and the Young Schema Questionnaire-Short Form (YSQ-SF) before and after a 2-month period of antidepressant treatment and were compared with 40 healthy control subjects.

Results And Conclusion: Depressive mood states were more likely to activate early maladaptive schemas compared to the anxious mood states, and treating these mood states simply with anti-depressive medications led to significant improvements in the activation of these schemas. We concluded that half of the schemas might be accepted as antidepressant treatment-resistant EMSs, or, in other words, they can be viewed in part as those specific to depressive mood states.