Difficulty Defining Depresion Deemed Difficulty in Decisionmaking

I was listening to the Ira Flato science program on National Public Radio in which two experts were discussing "depression". The word is one of those which is used by the general public and by clinical professionals, and due to its origins in common speech is applied to a very wide variety of conditions from feeling sad to being paralyzed by brain dysfunction. Not surprisingly, what one is encouraged to do about the condition depends on the degree, severity, causes and duration of the condition.

From the point of view of this blog, the fuzziness of the concept of depression might be worth exploring. It is hard to design epidemiological instruments to measure the incidence, prevalence and severity of the condition. It is also hard to define clinical criteria for prescription for the disease, and thus to estimate the need for alternative treatments in the population, and thus the need for resources to adequately address that need.