For more than 20 years, if my memory serves, we GPs in the UK have been berated for failing to diagnose depression in our patients. Numerous interventions have been found to be ineffective in improving our rates of identification. A paper we published in 2005 found that the diagnosis was not made in half of patients with possible major depression.1 An earlier paper in the BMJ suggested that one of the reasons is that the patients themselves may be reluctant to reveal their depressive symptoms,2 a view echoed in a study of postnatal depression.3 Identifying the problem is only the beginning and this month we are publishing a cluster of papers exploring the difficulties of management. According to the group in Norwich, looking at indicators of quality, the standard of care is variable: almost everyone was offered treatment, but fewer than half had an assessment …