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Antidepressant Withdrawal Not As Severe As Thought, Evidence Review Says

By Dennis Thompson HealthDay Reporter

Medically reviewed by Carmen Pope, BPharm. Last updated on July 11, 2025.

FRIDAY, July 11, 2025 — People typically don’t suffer severe withdrawal symptoms or fall into depression immediately after they stop taking antidepressants, a new evidence review says.

There had been concerns that people who quit antidepressants would suddenly fall prey to depression or develop what’s known as antidepressant discontinuation syndrome.

But those fears aren’t warranted, researchers write in JAMA Psychiatry.

“Despite previous concern about stopping antidepressants, our work finds that most people do not experience severe withdrawal, in terms of additional symptoms,” lead researcher Dr. Sameer Jauhar, a senior clinical lecturer at Imperial College London in the U.K., said in a news release.

“Importantly, depression relapse was not linked to antidepressant withdrawal in these studies, suggesting that if this does occur, people will need to see their health professional to rule out a recurrence of their depressive illness,” Jauhar added.

For the study, researchers pooled data from 49 clinical trials involving more than 17,800 people, looking at the symptoms observed when people quit taking antidepressants.

In most of the studies (44), people either abruptly quit the meds or tapered over one week, researchers said.

In placebo-controlled trials, the most common antidepressant withdrawal symptoms within the first two weeks were dizziness (7.5% versus 1.8%); nausea (4.1% versus 1.5%); vertigo (2.7% versus 0.4%); and nervousness (3% versus 0.8%).

Adding non-placebo studies increased symptom rates slightly: dizziness (11.8%); nightmares (8.1%); nervousness (7.6%); and nausea (5.8%).

The average number of withdrawal symptoms fell below the cutoff that would indicate clinically important health problems for specific patients, researchers said.

The most symptoms were seen when people stopped taking venlafaxine, a type of drug that works by increasing levels of the mood-regulating hormone serotonin in the brain. About 20% of people suffered from dizziness when they quit the drug, compared to just under 2% taking a placebo.

However, relapses of depression were not seen in people withdrawing from antidepressants, even among those with existing depression, researchers said.

“This cutting-edge review clarifies the scientific evidence and should reassure all parties about the use, and discontinuation, of these treatments,” researcher Allan Young, head of psychiatry at Imperial College London, said in a news release. “Official guidance should now be changed to reflect the evidence.”

This isn't likely, however. Other researchers criticized the new report, saying that the short-term clinical trials could not reflect the potential hazards of withdrawal for people who’ve been taking antidepressants for years.

“If you are looking at people on the drugs for eight weeks, you are not going to find withdrawal,” James Davies, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Roehampton in England, told The New York Times. “It’s like saying cocaine isn’t addictive because we did a study on people who had only been taking it for eight weeks."

Davies, who co-authored a 2019 study that found high rates of antidepressant withdrawal symptoms, is worried that the new review could “cause considerable harm by significantly downplaying the effects of real-world antidepressant use.”

He told The Times: “According to their conclusions, the tens of thousands of people online who are struggling with severe and protracted withdrawal aren’t really in withdrawal. There are real people out there on the ground that aren’t making up the fact that they are in a lot of pain coming off these drugs.”

Disclaimer: Statistical data in medical articles provide general trends and do not pertain to individuals. Individual factors can vary greatly. Always seek personalized medical advice for individual healthcare decisions.

© 2025 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Posted July 2025

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