‘I wish I had participated sooner’: How a medical trial changed a young man’s life | health
MMillions of young people risk not getting new treatments for their health conditions and having to use unsafe, ineffective or inappropriate medicines because too few of them participate in medical research. One of those who bucked the trend explains why he signed up for a study and how it changed his life.
Gulliver White was diagnosed with clinical depression when he was nineteen years old. For years, he suffered from extremely low moods, anxiety, frequent panic attacks, and occasional paranoia.
“I put everything I could into work because it was basically all I could do,” he says. “I didn’t really go out to see people. I just stayed home and slept a lot. My partner would wake me up and try to stop me from doing that, but I could easily sleep 18 hours a day. I basically retreated into myself.”
For the data analyst from Dunstable, Bedfordshire, even tasks such as brushing his teeth or showering have become difficult. “I wouldn’t have any energy or I’d be thinking: What’s the point of this?” Even though I wasn’t contemplating suicide, there was a feeling that it would have been a lot easier if I had just disappeared.
White tried a range of treatments, including antidepressants and talk therapies. But nothing calmed his symptoms.
“At best, I felt neutral. I could work but I wasn’t really living, just getting through the days. It was hard to know if I was better because I never felt truly happy.”
Then his mother found a clinical trial called PAX-D on Facebook. As a therapist, she was receiving a lot of information about mental health studies and thought the experience could help her son.
“At that point, I would try anything to feel better,” White says. “It was a particularly bad time. Shortly after I applied for the trial, I had to stop working because I couldn’t fit in. So it was lucky that she came across it and sent it when she did.”
The study, funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), was testing whether a commonly used drug for Parkinson’s disease could help treat treatment-resistant depression. Unlike antidepressants, which target serotonin, pramipexole mimics dopamine, which affects the energy people use to achieve goals.
“The day after I started taking the medication, I felt much better,” White says. “I gained more energy and stopped sleeping during the day. The quality of my sleep improved dramatically as did my overall mood.”
He continued to take pramipexole after the trial ended. One year ago, he stopped taking this medication, or any other antidepressants. It’s the longest he’s been off medication since he was 19.
Now 31, White has more energy, his personal life has improved, and he even started a new job at a mental health research company, inspired by his positive experience in the PAX-D trial.
“Everything isn’t the battle it was,” he says. “I don’t always feel like it would be better if it wasn’t there. I still get anxious, and some days are less than others, but it’s not the all-consuming thing it used to be.”
“I wish I could have been in the trial sooner. If I had known about it and it could have been done, I would have done it right away. Even if I had gone back and gotten the placebo and not gotten the actual drug itself, I would have done it.”
White encourages other young people to participate in research, as part of the national campaign carried out by the National Institution for Human Rights. UK-wide volunteer register It helps make it easier to join studies, by matching people with opportunities that match their interests and health concerns.
Anyone can participate in the research, Whether they have a health condition or not. Some trials look for people who do not have the condition being studied, so researchers can compare them with those who do.
“It’s important for people to think about participating in research,” White says. “The only reason I was able to get the help that I did in this experiment is because of the people who volunteered for the research before me. It’s reassuring to know that I helped push this experiment along a little bit.”