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Minerva

Light therapy for depression . . . and other stories

BMJ 2024; 384 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.q705 (Published 28 March 2024) Cite this as: BMJ 2024;384:q705

Bright light for depression

Bright light therapy can be helpful for adults with seasonal depression and with non-seasonal depression too. It’s an approach that is safe and non-invasive and would be well suited to adolescents with depression—except that it doesn’t seem to work in this age group. A trial in four centres in Germany randomised young people with moderate or severe major depressive disorder either to bright light therapy or to a placebo treatment using red light. Both groups improved over the four weeks of the trial, but bright light was no better than placebo (JAMA Psychiatry doi:10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2024.0103).

Long term effects of amblyopia

Amblyopia affects 1-3% of …

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