You probably haven't heard of Matt Dobek. Few outside of the NBA's Detroit Pistons basketball team had, until he took his own life. He worked as a liaison between the players and the press in the PR department. He was terminated a few months ago as part of a larger purge by ownership. That's when things began to deteriorate.

A new Harvard study suggests that a nutritional supplement sold over-the-counter may help some people with depression who haven't gotten better with any other drugs. Researchers found that adding the supplement, called S-Adenosyl Methionine, or SAMe, to a patients' antidepressant treatment helped more people with major depression improve their symptoms than those that took an inactive placebo on top of their normal medication. The supplement also had fewer side effects than medications that are approved by the FDA for people with depression who don't respond to antidepressants. "This is an exciting, yet preliminary finding," Dr. George Papakostas, the study's lead author and a psychiatrist at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, told Reuters Health.

St. John’s Wort (Hypericum perforatum) shows promise in aiding those suffering from premenstrual syndrome.  In a recent study from the University of Leeds researchers found that St John’s Wort was “statistically superior to placebo in improving physical and behavioral symptoms of PMS (p<0.05).”  Other outcomes of the study including hormonal assessments, anxiety, depression, and other variables did not improve significantly.  Another study of PMS-like symptoms among perimenopausal women found significant reduction in anxiety and hydration along with other outcomes using a combination of St. John’s Wort and chaste tree/berry (Vitex agnus-castus).  These additional studies from the last year will help pave the way for future research to isolate issues like dose, clinical prediction variables and underlying mechanisms for action.