Posted by JLM on September 30, 2002, at 5:36:13
I thought I would throw this out to the entire group.
For years, the biopsychiatrists have tried to convice people of the validity of 'chemical imbalances' as the root cause of mental illness.
In my mind this is highly debatable to say the least. There has never been and conclusive, objective, repeatable, and meaurable proof that
mental illness are definitely caused by chemical imbalances, or other organic causes. Not so with: heart disease, bacterial infections, hepatitis C, kidney disease, lung disease, stomach cancer, brain tumors, HIV, and allmost any other illness that you would care to mention, including even rare disorders such as Arnold Chari I malformation, autonomic neuropathy, etc. All are diagnosed by objective medical testing, and drugs can be show to be efficient in treating them by objective medical findings. Certainly a neurologist would not treat you for a brain tumor, with drugs that have
potentially hazardous side effects, without any objective evidence to back up the diagnoses. But in the practice of biopsychiatry its all 'mabye'. "Depression MAY be caused by a chemical imbalance. Zoloft corects this imbalance." I'm sure you have all seen the commercial. How can you claim to correct an imbalance when you aren't even sure it exists in the first place. It flawed logic in my humble opinion.
My question is this thou. Neurologists treat organic disorders of the brain and brain dysfunctions. If mood disorders and mental illness are truly caused by organic brain disorders, what is the need for psychiatry at all, when the practice of neurology allready exists?I'd like to note for the record, that I am not
dissmissing the idea of mental illness as something that is 'all in ones head'. As someone who has suffered from depression I certainly know
that to be the case. I just question the effeciency, as well as the safety of drugs being used to treat mood disorders in the absence
of definitive proof of a brain dysfunction. Especially the less than benign antidepressants. There has been a lot of contentious debate over AD's being barely more effective than placebos, the way in which drugs trials are conducted biasing the results which are again based upon purely SUBJECTIVE measures of illness severity, and the influence that drug companies have over doctors prescribing habits, and the FDA approval process.Something to think about.
poster:JLM
thread:1184
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20020829/msgs/1184.html