Methods	Twelve-week double-blind randomised multicentre study
Participants	Outpatients meeting DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for major depression, with a minimum baseline score of 20 on the 21-item HDRS, recruited from three clinical sites. Age range: 18-65 years. Exclusion criteria: known sensitivity to venlafaxine or fluoxetine, a history of any clinically significant cardiac, hepatic or renal disease or abnormalities on a screening physical examination, ECG or laboratory tests, with any mental or neurologic disorder and breast-feeding women; used of any investigational drug, antipsychotic drug, electroconvulsive therapy or sumatriptan within 30 days of baseline, fluoxetine within 21 days and MAO-I within 14 days
Interventions	Fluoxetine: 47 participants. Venlafaxine: 40 participants. Fluoxetine dose range: 20-40 mg/day. Venlafaxine dose range: 75-150 mg/day.
Outcomes	Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HDRS-21), Montgomery and Asberg Scale for Depression (MADRS), Clinical Global Impression Scale
Notes	Patients in the fluoxetine group had more chronic histories of depression at baseline. Predominance of females in the whole study. Funding: by industry
Risk of bias
Item	Authors’ judgement	Description
Allocation concealment?	Unclear	B - Unclear