Bendigo’s 54,610 residents aged between 18 and 64 were issued 85,488 antidepressant prescriptions in 2013/14, with the second highest rate occurring in the Central Goldfields Shire where 13,573 residents were issued 22,432 prescriptions over the same period.

Murray Primary Health Network medical adviser and adjunct professor at Monash University Ewa Piejko said rural and regional communities were more susceptible to the risk factors associated with depression, but could not explain why Bendigo had a higher rate than other similar localities.

Dr Piejko said drought, unemployment and an aging population were all contributing factors when it came to rates of depression in central Victoria.

“It’s probably very similar to many of the regional areas, so on the whole in regional Australia we know there’s an increased incidence of depression and anxiety and there’s also an increased incidence of chronic disease – diabetes, heart disease and things like that that would also increase the rates of depression,” she said.

“There’s lower socio-economic status, sometimes lower levels of employment, isolation that can occur, things like that can make it more difficult and increase the risk of depression.”

Dr Piejko said the fact that Bendigo topped the list for antidepressant prescriptions may actually be good news, reflecting an increase in treatment rather than an increase in illness.

“This may actually be a positive indicator that people are turning up to the doctor’s in the first place so people are more willing to seek support and they’re getting that support,” she said.

“There is good access to services and support [in Bendigo] so whilst you might have the same instance of depression in other rural areas it could be that there might not be the access to doctors and mental health practitioners to get that support.”

But Dr Piejko said there was still room for improvement and increased access to alternative therapies such as counselling might reduce central Victorians’ dependence on mediation to treat depressive disorders.

“We’ve got relatively good access but there could always be more,” she said.

“Certainly demand for access to psychiatric services outweighs the supply and increasing that access might reduce the numbers of antidepressant medication as we can manage people with counselling and other therapies.”

Dr Piejko said another possible reason for an over-reliance on medical intervention was time pressure on GPs.

“General practitioners are fairly time poor in being able to provide a lot of psychological services and support themselves, so whilst they undertake a lot of counselling in their sessions and that would be a major part of many general practitioners’ days, [when it comes to] providing higher level psychological services, they don’t have the time to do it,” she said.

Dr Piejko said the figures may also have been inflated by the fact that many patients do not take the antidepressants prescribed to them.

“My personal experience would be a lot of people get prescriptions for antidepressants and not take them,” she said.

“Particularly if they weren’t convinced they had depression and anxiety that needed to be managed, generally people don’t take the prescription.”

Maryborough – Pyrenees had the second highest rate of antidepressant prescriptions while Campaspe was 11th and Loddon – Elmore 14th.

The state’s lowest prescription rate was in central Melbourne at less than half the rate of Bendigo.