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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
[email protected]Shown: posts 1 to 5 of 5. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by denise1904 on January 19, 2022, at 9:51:15
You would think by now that they would be able to have determined some pattern of activity between a depressed brain, an anxious brain, a psychotic brain or a manic brain with fMRI scans.
I know there is no one uniformm "normal" type brain but sure if they for instance, took as many people as they could with bipolar disorder and scanned their brains during periods of normality, then during periods of highs and then during periods of depression, they would find some kind of correlation?? Or is it really not that simple?
I just don't understand, in all the time Ive suffered with depression (which I think is mainly anxiety as I'm always able to function) I have never been asked to have an fMRI scan.
Denise
Posted by Hugh on January 20, 2022, at 13:18:03
In reply to You would think by now, posted by denise1904 on January 19, 2022, at 9:51:15
Daniel Amen quote:
Over the past decade I have argued with many of my colleagues about the need to look at and evaluate the brain in psychiatry. Psychiatrists are the only medical specialists who rarely look at the organ they treat. In my opinion, the lack of brain imaging has kept psychiatry behind medicine's other specialties, decreasing our effectiveness with patients and helping to maintain stigma and noncompliance with needed treatment. Odds are if you are having serious problems with your feelings (depression or anxiety), thoughts (schizophrenia or bipolar disorder), or behavior (violence, pedophilia, or substance abuse), the psychiatrist treating you will never order a brain scan. He will prescribe psychotherapy or powerful medications without ever looking at how your specific brain works. He will not know which areas of your brain work well, which work too hard, or which do not work hard enough. Can you imagine the outcry if other medical specialists acted without looking? If orthopedists set broken bones without X rays? If cardiologists diagnosed coronary-artery blockages without angiograms or fast CAT scans? If internists diagnosed pneumonia without ordering chest X rays or sputum cultures? Or surgeons performed mastectomies without looking at breast tumors under the microscope to see if they were cancerous or not? Yet, the state of the art in psychiatry is not to look at the organ it treats.
Psychiatrists diagnose and treat patients based on symptom clusters, not underling brain dysfunction. Imagine taking your car to the mechanic because it is smoking, using too much gasoline, or stalling in the middle of intersections. The mechanic listens to the symptoms and decides to change the car's fuel pump, without ever looking under the hood. How would you feel? Probably like going somewhere else. It's silly. We must look at the brain if we are to really understand the problems we face.
Posted by Denise1904 on January 25, 2022, at 16:07:22
In reply to Re: You would think by now, posted by Hugh on January 20, 2022, at 13:18:03
Hi Hugh,
Thanks for sending me this, it echos my thoughts completely.
Years ago, in the early 90s when I first took an antidepressant, I asked the Doctor what they were doing because the effect they had on me was miraculous. He simple shrugged his shoulders and said I had a serotonin inbalance and they were just rebalancing it. I asked him why I had the inbalance in the first place and he said that he didn't know but if they worked just carry on taking them. So I did. I bought the story and just assumed that everyone with depression had a serotonin inbalance that was taken care of with antidepressants.
Years later, after being off them for three years, feeling well and thinking that depression was just something I suffered in my youth because of lac of direction, the ffffing depression comes back out of the blue, much worse, I take them again and have horrendous symptoms. This time another Doctor said "oh well, you must have a personality disorder"! Or sometimes, it's well it must be related to some kind of unresolved emotional trauma! FFFs sake. It's like trying to find a needle in a haystack.
People often liken depression and taking antidepressants to a diabetic needing insulin. It's nothing like it. We have no proof of what is wrong. Like the description by Dr Amen, we are effectively it's like putting more oil into a car to compensate for a malfunctioning engine. The problem is when drugs stop working, they don't know why because they don't know what they were doing in the first place!
Denise
Posted by Hugh on January 30, 2022, at 15:52:20
In reply to Re: You would think by now, posted by Denise1904 on January 25, 2022, at 16:07:22
Hi Denise,
In many ways, psychiatry is still in the Dark Ages.
I've had my brain looked at with EEG, thanks to doing neurofeedback. This is the treatment I've benefited from the most -- especially my anxiety.
Posted by jay2112 on February 10, 2022, at 22:24:34
In reply to Re: You would think by now, posted by Hugh on January 20, 2022, at 13:18:03
That is an awesome quote by a great man. I saw Daniel give a TED talk, and it was brilliant!
This is the end of the thread.
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