Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) - Winter Blues, Depression, or Just Your Imagination?

It's fairly normal to feel a bit down after all the hustle and bustle of the holidays. The frenetic activity level diminishes, the entertaining is on hold, credit card bills begin to arrive in the mail: no wonder you're depressed! Seriously, though, this article offers some information that may be helpful for you or someone you know.

The concept of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), a type of depression which can be triggered by changes in environmental light levels, dates back to Hippocrates who wrote about the changes of seasons producing diseases; although he was considering mainly a change in temperature versus light exposure and levels of exposure. Seasonal Affective Disorder received more prominence and acceptance as a type of depression when Rosenthal et al published a paper describing a group of patients with winter depression, Seasonal Affective Disorder, in 1984.

One finding in Rosenthal's report was the benefit of light therapy in relieving patient's symptoms of winter depression sometimes labeled winter SAD. So how do we determine whether we have Seasonal Affective Disorder, the "winter blues," depression, or if we're just imagining symptoms? Is Seasonal Affective Disorder a real condition? If so, is it treated like other types of depression?

Read the rest of this article at Associated Content for full details: Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD)