If depression is affecting you or someone you love, including after several treatments have not been enough: you are in the right place.
Depression: what non-drug and adjunctive evidence actually supports
Structured psychotherapy sits at the center of non-drug care. Medication remains an important treatment option outside the scope of this section, and some non-drug therapies become most relevant only in specific situations, such as relapse prevention, insomnia, or seasonal depression. Exercise and dietary improvement have evidence. Nutrition and complementary therapies do not belong in one simple category.
Structured psychotherapy and antidepressant medication are established first-line treatments. This page maps the non-drug and adjunctive options around that care, including psychotherapy as the non-drug center of gravity. It is not a medication ranking and not a plan to start or stop treatment. This is not personal medical advice. Use it to have a better conversation with your clinician, or a pharmacist when herbs or supplements are on the table.
The evidence landscape
How strong and broad the claims are. Not a menu. A landscape.
- 01 Core acute care
- 02 Strong when the gate is open
- 03 Lifestyle approaches
- 04 Stratified complementary options
- 05 Narrow add-on signal
Severity, where you are in the course of depression, and patterns such as insomnia or seasonality change which questions matter most. That’s why the landscape branches.
What are you trying to figure out?
Find your question. Everything below earns a place here. Grouping helps you locate it. Nothing important is removed.
Start here
The central acute-treatment questions.
When the situation changes
Relapse · Insomnia · Seasonal pattern
- Can mindfulness-based therapy help keep depression from coming back? MBCT · relapse prevention, not universal acute treatment
- I have depression and insomnia. Does treating sleep help both? CBT-I · the insomnia gate creates the treatment role
- Does a light box help depression? Strongest for seasonal depression · other claims are thinner
Exercise and diet
Lifestyle approaches with real evidence and important limits.
Nutrition and complementary options
Different claims. Different risks. Not one supplement aisle.
- What about St John’s wort? Real efficacy signal for specific extracts · interactions are part of the answer
- Is fish oil / omega-3 worth trying? Small, uncertain average effect · low-priority optional adjunct
- What does the evidence say about other nutraceuticals? Agent by agent · no single “supplements work” claim
- Should I buy probiotics for depression? Early add-on signal only · not established stand-alone treatment
Every question in this index now has a written answer. The grouping stays complete so you can compare core care, situation-specific treatments, lifestyle approaches, and narrower complementary options without flattening their differences.