Data mined from clinical trials may soon help doctors tailor antidepressant therapy to their patients, the authors say. Currently, only about 30% of patients get relief from the first drug they are prescribed, and it can often take a year or more before doctors find the right medication to alleviate symptoms of depression. The Yale team analyzed data from a large clinical trial on depression and pinpointed 25 questions that best predicted the patients’ response to a particular antidepressant. Using these questions, they developed a mathematical model to predict whether a patient will respond to Celexa after three months of treatment. “These are questions any patient can fill out in 5 or 10 minutes, on any laptop or smartphone, and get a prediction immediately,” explained Adam Chekroud, Ph.D. candidate in the Human Neuroscience Lab and lead author of the paper. - neurosciencenews.com