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GidMK's profile
Health Nerd
Health Nerd
Health Nerd
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@GidMK

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Health NerdVerified account

@GidMK

Epidemiologist. Writer (Guardian, Observer etc). "Well known research trouble-maker". PhDing at @UoW Host of @senscipod Email gidmk.healthnerd@gmail.com he/him

Sydney, New South Wales
theguardian.com/profile/gideon…
Joined November 2015

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    Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

    The reporting of this trial is a nightmare that could easily cause unintended pregnancies THE PILL ISN'T MAKING EVERYONE DEPRESSEDpic.twitter.com/3TOiMkA9ww

    9:42 PM - 28 Aug 2019
    • 11 Retweets
    • 19 Likes
    • Morgan West Beth Skwarecki Jeppe Olsen Lili S. John Baxindine Sujay Kakarmath stu erin very vaxxed Nick Hayward
    2 replies 11 retweets 19 likes
      1. New conversation
      2. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Study is here: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jcpp.13115 …

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      3. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Basically, the researchers took a group of people who'd been part of the NHANES data collection in both 2004 and 2017, and split them into 3 groups: - started oral contraceptives as a teen - started oral contraceptives as an adult - never used oral contraceptives

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      4. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        They then compared these groups in terms of their risk of depression at the final follow-up in 2017 They found that the risk of depression was associated with whether people used oral contraceptives, and when they started (teen vs adult)

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      5. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Essentially, the pill caused people to be depressed Scary!pic.twitter.com/yaly9YwSus

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      6. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        HOWEVER, there are some major limitations to this piece of research Firstly, there's the issue of confoundingpic.twitter.com/niHgv4Ex57

        1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
        Show this thread
      7. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        The groups of women that they looked at were different in some very important ways - people who had used the pill as adolescents were on average older, more likely to smoke, more likely to have endometriosis, poorer, etc etc

        1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
        Show this thread
      8. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Now, the researchers used what's known as a propensity model to try and control for this, but as ever it's really hard to account for every factor in studies like this We can only control for what we know and measure!

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      9. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        There's also a big issue with what's known as reverse causality Basically, it's hard to know whether pills = depression or depression = pills Potentially, this study showed that people who are experiencing depression might be more likely to go on the pillpic.twitter.com/I6pOGeptF3

        1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
        Show this thread
      10. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        This is somewhat supported by the study, because people who started using oral contraceptives in their teens were less likely to use them as adults - it's not unlikely that their mental health influenced the decision to use contraceptives rather than the other way around

        2 replies 0 retweets 1 like
        Show this thread
      11. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        It's also worth noting that, while the headline statistic is TRIPLE THE RISK, the absolute risk of depression associated with oral contraceptives was more like 5-10%

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      12. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Even more importantly, a large meta-analysis that came out last year looked at some specific types of oral contraceptive and found no relationship with depression at allpic.twitter.com/WjMyaPM7vi

        1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
        Show this thread
      13. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Does the pill have side-effects (sometimes really nasty ones)? Absolutely. I don't for a second want to diminish the impact that oral contraceptives can have

        1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
        Show this thread
      14. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        That being said, the fearmongering in these headlines is a massive headache. There may be ~some~ association between oral contraceptive use and depression, but it's not nearly as scary as you might've seen reported

        1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
        Show this thread
      15. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        Also, the side-effects of oral contraceptive use usually pale in comparison to the side-effects of pregnancy, so it's a bit of a challenging argument

        1 reply 1 retweet 0 likes
        Show this thread
      16. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        I wrote a blog about a similar study a while back, with almost identical issueshttps://medium.com/@gidmk/why-is-the-pill-so-depressing-1b429d271d33 …

        1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
        Show this thread
      17. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 28 Aug 2019

        I should also add - the authors of the paper were very upfront about all of this, and emphasized that women should still use contraceptives, so I think it's very much the media's problem here

        1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
        Show this thread
      18. End of conversation

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