How to deal with depression in the workplace

Learn how the issue can impact the work and when you need to communicate the upper

Dr. Ivan Mario Braun 

PSYCHIATRY - CRM 57449 / SP


Depression can impair the ability of the person to work and study, can occur from one slowing of reasoning, experiencing difficulty concentrating, to a desire to "spend the whole day lying in bed." Depression is characterized by a constellation of signs and symptoms including:

feeling of sadness, hopelessness or empty most of the time
great iminuição the ability to feel pleasure or interest in all or almost all activities
increased or decreased appetite
insomnia or oversleeping
psychomotor agitation or retardation
fatigue and loss of energy
feelings of worthlessness, excessive guilt or inappropriate
diminished ability to think, concentrate or indecisiveness
recurrent thoughts of death, suicidal ideation, suicide attempt or specific plan to commit suicide
Communicate or not to top

Left untreated depression, your income will return to normal
Report whether or not the state of the person to his superiors is a complicated issue. Depending on the heads, there can be understanding and even encouragement towards the person to treat. However, even today, there are people who have prejudices against psychiatric disorders and consider depression as a kind of weakness or laziness.




If depression interfere with the security of the person or the other, it is appropriate to report the problem to superiors. If this is not the case, it is up to the person to decide. One thing is certain: the physician should never disclose any data about the patient, except with the express agreement of this. In cases, for example, where there is the need for removal from service, coverage of treatment costs by health plans or removal by the social security service, the physician should warn the patient about the possibility of the information falling into the hands of professionals other than healthcare (for health professionals all have the obligation to maintain confidentiality) and that this knowledge can bring risks to the stability of employment. Despite that, the duration of the disease and treatment, the person can not be fired, there patrons who do not take this into consideration and, on the other hand, there have been cases in which, not to have labor problems, the boss expected improvement and then off one of his work.

How to get to the day surrender?

If a person working in an area in which the depressive state does not bring risk to herself or to others, it can facilitate their performance by dividing tasks into multiple segments. For example, a journalist, in this condition, instead of launching the production of a journalistic text as a whole, should proceed as a climber to climb a mountain, or just thinking about each step to be followed. Thus, the journalist makes a list of people to be interviewed or texts to be read. Then launches only a task, no matter how small, can run without having greater ambitions. If you can only do list, on a given day, stop there. If, on another day, interviewing a person or even just mark the time of the conversation, you should already admire his work because, for someone in depression, every effort should be commended. If you feel a little better doing intervals between each task should allow this attitude. Thus, step by step, slowly, one can carry out their work. Left untreated depression, your income will return to normal.



Finally, colleagues and superiors who know the person's status should be understanding and insist that the person in question. There are good treatments for depression, and if the superiors and colleagues have the necessary patience, usually within a few weeks or months will back the employee with all his ability to work.