Co-design of an antidepressant deprescribing toolkit
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Co-design of a toolkit for to support primary care healthcare professionals to deprescribe unnecessary antidepressants
IRAS ID
368563
Contact name
Sion Scott
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of East Anglia
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 3 months, 29 days
Research summary
Background
1-in-5 people take antidepressants for common mental disorders like anxiety or depression. The Royal College of Psychiatrists recommends that most people prescribed antidepressants for a common mental disorder only need to take them for 6 to 12 months after feeling better. There’s more chance of side effects the longer someone takes antidepressants so it is important they are stopped if and when they are no longer needed.Unfortunately, most people stay on antidepressants longer than they need. This is especially true for certain groups like people living in poorer areas and LGBTQ+ people.This creates health inequalities.
Research shows that for people who get better from their common mental disorder, and so stop their antidepressant, the chance of their mental health problem coming back is no different to people who continue taking their antidepressant. Most people who take antidepressants for a long time want to stop but they say they don’t get enough help. Our previous research found that healthcare professionals don’t have what they need to help people stop antidepressants.
Aim
To create a support package of things that healthcare professionals in GP surgeries need to stop antidepressants for people who want to stop.Plan
We have already looked at past research to find out what has been tried to support healthcare professionals to help people stop antidepressants. Now we need to:
1) Use focus groups/interviews with healthcare professionals, people who have taken antidepressants and mental health charity workers to ask what they think about the things that have already been tried. Then we will ask them for new ideas of things that might help.
2) Use co-design workshops with the people from Step 2 to pick the best things for supporting healthcare professionals to help people stop antidepressants. They will then design these into the support package.We will then test the support package in a future study.
REC name
Wales REC 6
REC reference
26/WA/0068
Date of REC Opinion
12 Mar 2026
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion