Depressed :)

gmatrant · Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 5:45 pm Post subject: Depressed :)

According to a review of 61 studies of patients suffering from severely
debilitating depression, a large majority of the patients reported that
missing a night's sleep immediately lifted their depression.
Yet, sleep-deprivation is not used to treat depression even though
the conventional treatments, which use drugs and electric shocks, often
have serious side effects.
Which of the following, if true, best explains the fact that
sleep-deprivation is not used as a treatment for depression?
(A) For a small percentage of depressed patients, missing a night's
sleep induces a temporary sense of euphoria.
(B) Keeping depressed patients awake is more difficult than keeping
awake people who are not depressed.
(C) Prolonged loss of sleep can lead to temporary impairment of judgment
comparable to that induced by consuming several ounces of alcohol.
(D) The dramatic shifts in mood connected with sleep and wakefulness have
not been traced to particular changes in brain chemistry.
(E) Depression returns in full force as soon as the patient sleeps
for even a few minutes.

None of the answer choices seem appropriate. Can anyone justify clearly how E is the right answer (OA is E). By POE its possible to boil down to E, but I couldn't reason out why E should be right.

E says that depression returns in full force as soon as the patient sleep for even for a few minutes, so the person gets more depressed only if he sleeps, so depriving him of sleep should be good. Even if this treatment is not going to be used, he is sometime or the other going to catch a wink where depression will return, so how does this in any way support the premise.

Pls explain.

Prasanna · Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 6:58 pm Post subject:

E is correct option here. You do not even need to apply POE to find that out I think. Option says why sleep deprivation is not used when it has shown to cure depression. The treatment is very temporal in nature. It works only till the person does not sleep. Man has to sleep sooner than later and the depression returns. Hence the treatment is not practically viable.