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DepressionResource.org
Part of The Shrink NetworkDepression. Understood.

Editorial strategy

Editorial strategy

How this site decides what to publish, what it hands off to the rest of The Shrink Network, how it handles evidence, and how it routes readers to care. Written to be verifiable by readers, search engines, and AI answer engines.

What this site is

DepressionResource.org is depression-specific patient education. It explains how depression can appear, how its symptoms connect, what treatment and support options exist, and when faster action is needed. It is not medical advice and it does not create a doctor-patient relationship. It is a publication of shrinkMD Publishing, LLC, and its clinical content is medically reviewed by Shariq Refai, MD, MBA, FAPA.

Who it is for

People experiencing depression, people supporting a family member or partner or friend with depression, and people trying to decide what kind of help may fit their situation. Clinicians are not the primary audience of this site. Clinician-facing content lives on shrinkiatry.com and PsychiatryRx.

What this site owns editorially

Practical, depression-specific patient education. Specifically:

What it hands off to which sister site

Every property in The Shrink Network has one job. When a reader's next question is a better fit for another site, we link to that site instead of writing a duplicate page here. The handoffs are enforced by the network standard; see shrinknetwork.com/editorial-standards.

  • Short canonical definitions of terms go to Shrinktionary. Our glossary entries render Shrinktionary's canonical definition verbatim at the top and add the depression-specific angle below.
  • Full encyclopedia entries for concepts, conditions, symptoms, and treatments go to Shrinkopedia.
  • Individual medication monographs go to PsychiatryRx.
  • Anxiety-specific patient education goes to AnxietyResource.
  • Research translation, effect sizes, and evidence summaries go to AnxietyResearch.
  • One evidence-based concept a day lives on ShrinkDaily.
  • Structured self-guided practice goes to shrinQ.
  • Private journaling and brief resets go to Unstuck.
  • Attention and phone-use boundaries go to QuitScrolling.
  • Psychiatry as a profession and career resources go to shrinkiatry.com.
  • Founder essays and books go to shariqrefai.com.
  • Clinical evaluation, medication management, and ongoing psychiatric care go to shrinkMD. See how care routing works below.
  • Ecosystem navigation lives on shrinknetwork.com.

How a page earns a place here

No page ships on this site until a written Page Justification Record has been completed and reviewed. The record asks 22 questions before drafting begins. If any question cannot be answered defensibly, the page does not ship. The record forces us to confirm: this site owns the topic, no existing page already satisfies the same intent, the primary search intent is clear, the sources meet the evidence standard below, the appropriate reviewer is named, and the page has at least one contextually relevant inbound internal link before it goes live.

The gate is codified in this repository at docs/page-justification-gate.md. Every proposed URL goes through it, including URLs suggested by keyword tools or AI systems. Keyword volume alone is not a reason to publish.

Evidence standard

Every substantive medical or clinical claim is source-cited inline. Sources are used in approximately this order of authority:

  1. Current clinical practice guidelines from APA, WHO, ACOG, USPSTF, and equivalents.
  2. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses (Cochrane, JAMA, NEJM, Lancet).
  3. FDA prescribing information and DailyMed for medication facts.
  4. Government and public-health sources (NIMH, NIH, CDC, SAMHSA, HRSA, FDA, CMS, state agencies).
  5. Peer-reviewed primary research indexed in PubMed.
  6. Major professional organizations (APA, ADAA, DBSA, AAMFT).
  7. Authoritative textbooks or reference works when appropriate.
  8. High-quality academic medical centers for accessible secondary explanation.

We do not cite marketing pages, unsourced blogs, competitor content, unverifiable studies, or AI-generated citations. We do not use a single small study to support a broad conclusion. When evidence is preliminary, mixed, or U.S.-specific, the page says so.

The full evidence and correction policy is at editorial standards and corrections policy.

How care routing works

When a page discusses a decision to seek care, we name five options in the order most people find useful, not one. This is the editorial framing on every type page, and it is deliberate.

  1. Your primary care doctor. The entry point most people already have. Can screen with the PHQ-9, rule out medical contributors, and start a first-line antidepressant.
  2. A therapist through Psychology Today's directory or your insurance panel.
  3. A psychiatrist, through the American Psychiatric Association's Find a Psychiatrist directory. Wait times are often long.
  4. shrinkMD, one telepsychiatry option in multiple states, or start care at shrinkMD.
  5. For a crisis: call or text 988, call 911, or go to the nearest emergency department.

DepressionResource.org takes no referral or affiliate commission for care. We name shrinkMD because the site's editor and shrinkMD's founder are the same person and disclosure is required. We name it as one option, not as a recommendation above other qualified clinicians. shrinkMD is not appropriate for emergencies, not licensed in every state, and not the right fit for every reader.

Independence and disclosures

shrinkMD Publishing, LLC publishes this site. shrinkMD is a separate telepsychiatry practice operated by an affiliate. The editor and medical reviewer of this site, Shariq Refai, MD, is the founder of shrinkMD and has a financial interest in it. That relationship is disclosed openly on every page that references the practice, in the byline on every article, and in full on the About page, Financial disclosure, and Find a therapist.

The site sells nothing directly. It receives no fee, commission, or referral revenue for listing shrinkMD or any other practice. It does not run advertising, does not use affiliate links, and does not sell information to data brokers.

Machine-readable spine

The site publishes structured data so search engines and AI systems can read it accurately without inference:

Structured data on every content page includes MedicalWebPage, Article, DefinedTerm (where applicable) with sameAs pointing at the canonical Shrinktionary URL, and a ShrinkNetworkConceptID identifier. The Person node for the reviewer is declared once site-wide and referenced by @id from every page.

Reviewing this page

This document is reviewed at least once per calendar quarter as part of the quarterly site review, and whenever the network standard at shrinknetwork.com/editorial-standards changes. Changes are reflected here first, then in the pages that implement them.

Reviewed by Shariq Refai, MD, MBA. Last reviewed March 15, 2026.

Every clinical page on DepressionResource.org is written in plain language, dated, and reviewed by a board-certified psychiatrist against current clinical guidelines. See our editorial standards and medical review process.