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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
[email protected]Shown: posts 1 to 14 of 14. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Jon Barnes on February 4, 2001, at 20:34:23
Where in California is Dr. Jensen located? I tried a search for his webpage but came up with nothing. Also, has anyone on this board tried his protocol and/or visited his office?
Posted by Shell on February 4, 2001, at 21:28:13
In reply to Dr. Martin Jesen, posted by Jon Barnes on February 4, 2001, at 20:34:23
> Where in California is Dr. Jensen located? I tried a search for his webpage but came up with nothing. Also, has anyone on this board tried his protocol and/or visited his office?
This is his url: www.drjensen.com
I just tried it (Sun 2/4/01) and it is working.His address is:
Martin T. Jensen, MD
30110 Crown Valley Parkway, Suite # 108
Laguna Niguel, CA 92677
(949)363-2600E-mail: [email protected]
Posted by JohnL on February 5, 2001, at 19:17:42
In reply to Dr. Martin Jesen, posted by Jon Barnes on February 4, 2001, at 20:34:23
The previous post has Dr Jensen's address.
I have firsthand experience in being one of his patients. He is awesome, that's all I can say. Excellent bedside manners, excellent expertise in drugs and brain chemistry. He seems to have an uncanny gift in choosing which meds to try and to know what the results of each mean. He approaches a psychiatric illness kind of like a detective searching for clues.
He did not directly choose the specific drugs that ended up helping me a lot, but he did lay down the roadmap that led to those drugs. I only had one session with him. In that one session he layed out a map of 9 different drugs to try (3 in one class, 3 in another class, 3 in another class) for about one week each. This would provide clues. And it did. His system worked flawlessly, though I have to admit it was a real bummer each time I tried a new drug and didn't like it. I'm glad there were a couple in there that I like a lot. It would have taken me years to discover those drugs by conventional methods. He shortened it to about 3 months. Not bad after 10 years of getting nowhere.
You can pretty much get a good handle on his detective approach by reading and re-reading his book a few times. "The Successful Treatment of Brain Chemical Imbalance" is a must read in my opinion.
John
Posted by Jon Barnes on February 6, 2001, at 1:14:28
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen, posted by JohnL on February 5, 2001, at 19:17:42
JohnL,
A few questions for you concerning your visit to Dr. Jensen as I am considering paying him a visit myself. I'm assuming that you actually visited his office.
1. How long ago did you visit his office?
2. How far in advance did you have have to book your appointment (i.e., is there a one year waiting period or is he fairly accessible)?
3. Did he send you home with nine Rx's from your visit?
4. How did you go about following up with him re: meds he prescribed (i.e., this one worked so do this or that). By conf call directly with you or your pdoc?
Any other info you could pass along would be appreciated. I do have his book but I must confess that I don't fully comprehend all that's in it.
JB
> The previous post has Dr Jensen's address.
>
> I have firsthand experience in being one of his patients. He is awesome, that's all I can say. Excellent bedside manners, excellent expertise in drugs and brain chemistry. He seems to have an uncanny gift in choosing which meds to try and to know what the results of each mean. He approaches a psychiatric illness kind of like a detective searching for clues.
>
> He did not directly choose the specific drugs that ended up helping me a lot, but he did lay down the roadmap that led to those drugs. I only had one session with him. In that one session he layed out a map of 9 different drugs to try (3 in one class, 3 in another class, 3 in another class) for about one week each. This would provide clues. And it did. His system worked flawlessly, though I have to admit it was a real bummer each time I tried a new drug and didn't like it. I'm glad there were a couple in there that I like a lot. It would have taken me years to discover those drugs by conventional methods. He shortened it to about 3 months. Not bad after 10 years of getting nowhere.
>
> You can pretty much get a good handle on his detective approach by reading and re-reading his book a few times. "The Successful Treatment of Brain Chemical Imbalance" is a must read in my opinion.
> John
Posted by Neal on February 6, 2001, at 3:34:28
In reply to Dr. Martin Jesen, posted by Jon Barnes on February 4, 2001, at 20:34:23
I have actually visited his office. (I live an hour away.) I filled out his forms and told him my symtoms. Instead of saying *Yes! Let's do this!*, he seemed totally at a loss. Finally he pulled out a list of AD's, and with my help, he came up with a random bunch of AD's to try, beginning with, of all things, Luvox. He never once consulted or used the principles in his book, that I could tell.
The best book for all of you to read is Stephen M. Stahl's book -Essential Psychopharmacology of Depression and Bipolar Disorder.
Despite the formitable title, it is readable and understandable by the layman, has a lot of illustrations, and has ideas for treatment. It can be ordered thru Amazon.
Posted by JohnL on February 6, 2001, at 3:37:55
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for JohnL, posted by Jon Barnes on February 6, 2001, at 1:14:28
> JohnL,
>
> A few questions for you concerning your visit to Dr. Jensen as I am considering paying him a visit myself. I'm assuming that you actually visited his office.
>
> 1. How long ago did you visit his office?
>
> 2. How far in advance did you have have to book your appointment (i.e., is there a one year waiting period or is he fairly accessible)?
>
> 3. Did he send you home with nine Rx's from your visit?
>
> 4. How did you go about following up with him re: meds he prescribed (i.e., this one worked so do this or that). By conf call directly with you or your pdoc?
>
> Any other info you could pass along would be appreciated. I do have his book but I must confess that I don't fully comprehend all that's in it.
>
> JBHi Jon,
Here are the answers to your questions:
1) My meeting with him was about a year ago. However, it was not face to face. He did a one hour phone visit with me and then faxed results to my local doctor recommendations. He required speaking with my local doc on the phone first before doing anything. And he required my blood test results before doing anything.2) I believe it was about a 4 week wait for an appointment. But often you can get in quicker if there is a cancellation. They can put your name on a list if you want to be on standby in case someone else can't make it.
3) He faxed the RX options to me and to my local doctor. He had the nine drugs broken down into 3 groups. I was to try 3 drugs from each group, for about a week each, followed by another local doc visit to prep for the next three, or to speak with Jensen again.
4) Until the nine drugs had been tried, there was little reason to speak with Dr Jensen again just yet. I could have if I wanted to, but it wasn't necessary. He had armed me and my local doc with enough instructions and ideas to keep us busy for a while. But if I had finished sampling all nine drugs and had no luck with any of them, then another phone visit would have been needed.
I just happened to find the right drugs and never needed another visit.
Posted by MarkinBoston on February 6, 2001, at 16:50:12
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for JohnL, posted by JohnL on February 6, 2001, at 3:37:55
The revised edition of his book seems a little closer to reality. I had put my name on his office's waiting list a while ago and last week they called me. I gave them my visa # and they billed me $50-something. Hasn't appeared at my door yet. Billing my card is a step beyond "sent to the publisher" status of the last few months.
Posted by shellie on February 7, 2001, at 14:16:25
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for JohnL, posted by JohnL on February 6, 2001, at 3:37:55
> 4) Until the nine drugs had been tried, there was little reason to speak with Dr Jensen again just yet. I could have if I wanted to, but it wasn't necessary. He had armed me and my local doc with enough instructions and ideas to keep us busy for a while. But if I had finished sampling all nine drugs and had no luck with any of them, then another phone visit would have been needed.
>
> I just happened to find the right drugs and never needed another visit.John L- truely not trying to be controversial (having read a lot of controversy in the past concerning Dr. Jensen), I am curious why you respect him so much since he gave you nine medications that did not work. And after talking to you for an hour. Is it the technique of trying things quickly that impressed you. Do you feel at all a bit taken that he was not head on, on any of his recommendations and that you had to find your own, partly out of the U.S. I know Michael F. highly respects him because he was a lot closer in picking the right combination (and an unlikely combination), but with you and Neal, it feels like he wasn't even close. Shellie
Posted by JohnL on February 8, 2001, at 4:12:25
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for JohnL » JohnL, posted by shellie on February 7, 2001, at 14:16:25
> John L- truely not trying to be controversial (having read a lot of controversy in the past concerning Dr. Jensen), I am curious why you respect him so much since he gave you nine medications that did not work. And after talking to you for an hour. Is it the technique of trying things quickly that impressed you. Do you feel at all a bit taken that he was not head on, on any of his recommendations and that you had to find your own, partly out of the U.S. I know Michael F. highly respects him because he was a lot closer in picking the right combination (and an unlikely combination), but with you and Neal, it feels like he wasn't even close. ShellieHi Shellie,
You ask some very good questions. I'll try to address them as best I can. It isn't controversial at all.First off, please understand that prior to these 9 drugs, I had already tried 9 others in the 5 years or so leading up to it. I had already learned that drug choice isn't really a whole lot better than a random guess, since the results can turn out to be a lot different than what the doctor predicted. I felt like every 2 or 3 months that went by was a total waste of time. I didn't want to stay with a drug that long if I didn't like it. But I was given no choice.
With Dr Jensen I was able to try more drugs, except in an accelerated fashion. I liked that. Instead of taking another few years to explore some drugs, I was instead looking at about 3 months. That seemed very very attractive to me. As long as it's just an educated guessing game anyway with no idea in advance of what the results will be, I liked the idea of sampling drugs I hadn't tried, especially in a speeded up fashion.
Jensen didn't actually prescribe any meds for me. He made a list of suggestions with his reasoning behind them. It was up to me and my local doctor to actually decide which to try and in what order. Then my local doc wrote the actual prescriptions.
I think what is important to realize is that with Jensen's method, the first couple or three visits are not intended directly in finding the right drug, though it's nice when that happens sometimes. Instead, the purpose is to gather clues from which the best drugs can be identified. Since I only sought help from Jensen on one visit, he never had the opportunity to add up the clues and make his best bets. I ended up doing this part of it myself, mainly because I felt capable of doing it and I needed to avoid the expense of more doctor bills.
It's true Jensen did not suggest the actual drugs that worked best for me. But it was his method that led to the discovery of the correct drugs. Without his strategy I would still be stuck back in SSRI land.
Hope this helps clear it up a little.
John
Posted by shellie on February 8, 2001, at 8:10:46
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Shellie, posted by JohnL on February 8, 2001, at 4:12:25
>
Posted by MarkinBoston on February 10, 2001, at 22:11:54
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-New Edition ready, posted by MarkinBoston on February 6, 2001, at 16:50:12
Today I received Jensen's updated version of his 4-5 year old book. Its much better organized and most closely resembles course/lab notes for a seminar. Its much easier to read than texts targeted for doctors, though references are at the end of each chapter. The lab-guide portions include tables of symptom frequency for different imbalances, and note sheets to record results from trying the drugs in each one of his protocols. The drugs are ordered with preference to effectiveness and shortest half-life (so drugs can be gone through more quickly). Jensen hasn't finished yet and indicates sections will be added later.
I think the new edition goes a long way toward promoting his protocol by making the testing so much easier to understand and follow. This book isn't about minor nuances of trying drug A vs. drug B, its about quickly trying drugs A, B, C, and D to see what happens with each. There are some notes about his experience with efficacy, like Effexor being the "most successful medicine" in his clinic, and other notes concern safety, like Wellbutrin having "1 in 1000 siezure risk".
Living in Boston where mental masturbation is rampant, the straightforward action approach is refreshing. No psychoanalysis, cognative therapy, talk therapy, or wanking, just go through this list trying these drugs!
The front cover is much better, Dr. Jensen's sketch of a brain section instead of a bad, New Age'y photo of an actress who was in the TV sitcom Eight is Enough. This alone boosts credibility.
Is it worth $50 + s&h to us here? Possibly, if the above sounds like what you want. I think the charts and tables help a mental health professional quickly evaluate and select treatment for patients.
> The revised edition of his book seems a little closer to reality. I had put my name on his office's waiting list a while ago and last week they called me. I gave them my visa # and they billed me $50-something. Hasn't appeared at my door yet. Billing my card is a step beyond "sent to the publisher" status of the last few months.
Posted by DanD on May 2, 2001, at 0:19:20
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for JohnL » JohnL, posted by shellie on February 7, 2001, at 14:16:25
Shellie wrote:
Truely not trying to be controversial (having read a lot of controversy in the past concerning Dr. Jensen), I am curious why you respect him so much...Shelly, I am considering Dr Jensen and I'd sure appreciate it if you could tell me where I could find the controversial info on him.
Thanks Shellie! DanD
Posted by shelliR on May 2, 2001, at 11:23:57
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for Shellie, posted by DanD on May 2, 2001, at 0:19:20
>
> Shellie wrote:
> Truely not trying to be controversial (having read a lot of controversy in the past concerning Dr. Jensen), I am curious why you respect him so much...
>
>
>
> Shelly, I am considering Dr Jensen and I'd sure appreciate it if you could tell me where I could find the controversial info on him.
>
> Thanks Shellie! DanD
DanD--
The controversy, I think, surrounded whether you can tell if a medication is going to be effective by trying it for just a few days, (jenson's claim). But reading through the posts will give you a better idea of the talk around Jenson. I believe that is what I was referring to. (It's been a while) Shelli
Posted by JahL on May 2, 2001, at 13:16:43
In reply to Re: Dr. Martin Jesen-Q for Shellie, posted by DanD on May 2, 2001, at 0:19:20
> > Shelly, I am considering Dr Jensen and I'd sure appreciate it if you could tell me where I could find the controversial info on him.Hi Dan.
I don't particularly want to go into it , but I know the guy personally & I can't say I'm overly impressed. His famed technique certainly didn't 'fix' me & was quickly abandoned.
He's worth seeing if you're keen to try a multitude of drugs, some of which other pdocs may baulk @ prescribing, but beyond that...well it's yr decision.
J.
This is the end of the thread.
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