Table 3.

Incidence of withdrawal and measure of severity (by numerical count of DESS or investigator global assessment) for specific antidepressants in double-blind randomised controlled trials captured in Davies and Read [5]

Antidepressant	Study (year)	Definition of withdrawal syndrome	People with withdrawal syndromes	Total stopped from medication	Proportion with withdrawal (%)	Average rate of withdrawal (%)	Severity or numerical score of withdrawal
Escitalopram	Montgomery (2005)	DESS ≥ 4	49	181	27.1	27.1	N/A
Paroxetine	Oerhberg (1995)	Any D-E symptom	19	55	35	58.9	N/A
	Rosenbaum (1998)	DESS ≥ 4	39	59	66		7.8 DESS
	Hindmarch (2000)	DESS ≥ 4	22	22	100		10.1 DESS
Fluoxetine	Rosenbaum (1998)	DESS ≥ 4	9	53	14	50	0.2 DESS
	Zajecka (1998)	Any D-E symptom	64	95	67		N/A
	Hindmarch (2000)	DESS ≥ 4	17	22	77		1.3 DESS
Sertraline	Rosenbaum (1998)	DESS ≥ 4	38	63	60	59.2	5.7 DESS
	Hindmarch (2000)	DESS ≥ 4	13	22	59		2.5 DESS
	Sir (2005)	Any D-E symptom	39	67	58		34.3% (moderate or worse)a
Citalopram	Hindmarch (2000)	DESS ≥ 4	14	20	70	70.0	3.0 DESS
Venlafaxine	Sir (2005)	Any D-E symptom	55	62	88.7	88.7	43.5% (moderate or worse)a

D-E discontinuation-emergent, DESS discontinuation-emergent signs and symptoms, N/A not available

^aIn Sir [52], the AntiDepressant Discontinuation Scale was used to measure withdrawal symptoms. This is a clinician-rated checklist of 30 signs and symptoms that assess the intensity (0–3 scale) of adverse events and the putative relationship of adverse events to discontinuation (1–4 scale) developed for this study. The AntiDepressant Discontinuation Scale also included a global investigator assessment of severity of discontinuation symptoms on a 6-point Likert scale (from 0 = none to 5 = very severe). Proportions reported are those patients who were rated as having moderate, severe or very severe discontinuation symptoms, i.e. a score of 4 or greater out of 6 on this Likert severity scale