Dr. Stuart Eisendrath – When Antidepressants Aren’t Enough: Harness The Power of Mindfulness to Alleviate Depression

Aired Wednesday, October 30, 2019 at 5:00 PM PST / 8:00 PM EST

Growing up in the 1950’s and early 60’s, I had a friend whose mother always seemed to be sad. When in my innocence I would ask her what’s wrong, she would say that she had the blues. She said that she would feel better in a while, but always seemed to be experiencing “the blues.” As I got older, I came to understand that she and many others suffered from depression.

Today, according to the World Health Organization, an estimated one hundred million people world-wide are suffering from depression, with antidepressant drugs as the most common treatment. More than one sixth of Americans take a psychiatric medicine, usually an antidepressant.

What if these medications only work partially or not at all? What other means are available to those suffering from chronic depression? Are there natural mindfulness techniques that may be used to deal effectively with depression?

My guest this week on Destination Unlimited, Dr. Stuart Eisendrath, pioneered research into the therapeutic effects of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) and developed an easy-to-implement program that has been scientifically proven in a National Institute of Health study to bring relief to chronic sufferers of depression by helping them realize that negative thoughts are not their reality.

Dr. Eisendrath is the founding director the University Of California San Francisco Depression Center. A senior clinician and research psychiatrist at UCSF, his lectures on MBCT for University of California Television have been viewed more than 1-1/2 million times. His website is stuarteisendrath.com and he joins me this week to discuss his new book, When Antidepressants Aren’t Enough: Harness The Power of Mindfulness to Alleviate Depression.