Does UV Light Therapy Work For Bipolar Disorder

Light therapy has for long been known to help people suffering from “The blues”. Be it just going out in the sun for some time or sitting for an hour in front of a bright light, it has shown a lot of promise and has been used as a way to treat certain kinds of depression for more than 20 yrs now.

UV Light Therapy Information

It is only lately that researchers have been intrigued as to whether the same technique will work for other kinds of depression too. For example, until now most UV light therapy information was only regarding SAD or 5htp seratonin winter depression.

UV Light Therapy Effects

Now recent research has showed that UV light therapy effects can be found even on other kinds of depression. For instance in a recent study conducted on people over 60 yrs of age, it was found that UV light therapy will 5htp thin the blood effects can be seen in as little as two or three weeks. If you think that this is a little too long for any kind of medication to take effect, well most natural antidepressant supplements too take as long before you can feel its effects.

In another study conducted by the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Medicine, it was found that UV light therapy was very effective in reducing depression symptoms. The sample for the study was very small, but the UV light therapy information that came out of this study points to far greater scope for this kind of treatment.

Understanding Bipolar Disorder

Until now the biggest problem with bipolar disorder patients has been that while it was very easy to control mania, it was not so with depression. This meant that while mania could be controlled very quickly, depression continued on for a long time, sometimes weeks on end.

In the study it was found that UV light therapy effects on women were very positive. 42% of them showed total response while 22% showed partial response. All the women in the study were continuing to take natural antidepressant pills during this time, but the results of the study show that if not anything else, UV light therapy will at least increase the effectiveness of medication.

While most of the UV light therapy information is inconclusive because of various reasons (the sample size being too small, it wasn’t a double blinded study or any one of a number of reasons) all preliminary information points to UV light therapy information effects being for real.

As of now not much is known. For instance in the above study the participants were asked to undergo the therapy for between 15 min and 45 min. The duration is very important in light therapy because with too little exposure to light there may not be any UV light therapy effects.

UV light therapy information is however very upbeat about this new technique, and considering that there is absolutely no negative side effects at all with using this technique, there’s no reason to start using light therapy as a catalyst to regular natural antidepressant pills.

The only caveat is that mornings have been found to be not too effective with mid day therapy giving the best results.