There's a significant population of science denying cranks and so those who want to raise legit concerns about the quality and alas, often motivation of medical studies are easily grouped with those. But: 1. There's no such thing as good / bad cholesterol. This is complete baloney and Pfizer lost a staggering amount of money when a drug raising good cholesterol got as far as human trials -- and failed them. There is…
Add polyunsaturated fats to that list
If you really want to dive into the wealth of counter narrative research that's being conducted, here's a huge collection
http://haidut.me
It's sorta fascinating how anti depressants work yet no one really know how or why they work.
We know how and why SSRIs work in regards to serotonin. We don’t understand why some people produce little or absorb serotonin too quickly requiring SSRIs drugs to manage it.
> The diagnosis and treatment of ADHD in adults but most especially in children is extremely suspect. Go on… (I’m adult diagnosed, for disclosure, but please do go on and tell me how suspect my diagnosis was, how I shouldn’t have been diagnosed as a child, how my medication is harmful. Go on and tell me about my life which you know better than I do.)
Don't take it personal. Both things can be true, you can have adhd and adhd can be overdiagnosed, doesn't mean that none of those diagnostics are valid. I'm sure you must be tired of people telling you about how overdiagnosed adhd is, I'm sorry about that, but don't take it personal, it's just a person on the internet.
GP also claimed the treatment is extremely suspect yet provided nothing to back up the claim. Does GP think the treatment does not work? AFAIK it is among the most treatable psychiatric illnesses.
SSRIs raise extra-synaptic serotonin levels within the first hour of taking them. However, their efficacy against depression takes weeks or even months to manifest. We've known this for decades, and as a result the "chemical imbalance" theory of depression hasn't been a real contender in depression research for a long, long time. The key thing to understand is that serotonin levels don't have to be low for SSRIs to i…
> the pop-culture misunderstandings about "low serotonin"
Let’s be clear though, I had an actual licensed psychiatrist say this to me last week. It’s not like people are getting this “pop-culture” information via blog articles…
Ketamine treatment is interesting, but it's not really a replacement for SSRIs. The anti-depressant effects of Ketamine are unfortunately relatively short-lived. Tolerance also seems to develop to the effects over time. There are some adventurous providers experimenting with frequent ketamine dosing over long periods of time, but the results haven't really been great from what I've seen. Also, a psychedelic experienc…
How about psilocybin? One recent article posted here suggested something like one dose every six months had measurable impact on depression.
I support psychadelic legalization but at the same time I wonder how much of the antidepressive effect of psychadelics is just from giving space for thought in your day to day life. For exmaple, the modern human wakes up, starts scrolling instagram, goes to work, goes home, continues scrolling instagram, then sleeps. There is no period of reflection or introspective thought, since every mundane activity where you could be reflecting internally, e.g. washing the dishes or walking to the train, is consumed by a podcast you have playing from your airpods. For some people, taking a psychadelic drug is the only time they give themselves to do nothing but think internally for a few hours. I wonder if they would get the same benefit just setting aside regular designated meditation time where their thoughts aren't being interloped by all these forces in modern society that vie for our attention.
This is completely unsurprising and indicative of how limited our understanding of the brain is. It reminds me of Pfizer's work on gabapentin. A professor from Northwestern was working on GABA antagonists (by modifying GABA itself) and eventually came up with the drug. It was hailed as a great example of "structure-based drug design". The drug was approved by the FDA and efficacious for a number of issues like neurop…
Do you have links to more info on this? Sort of an armchair pharmocologist and had never heard this about gabapentin. I thought it was a straight up gaba agonist like phenibut. But makes sense that it would be different given its very unusual dose response curve/self potentiation.
(Probably making anyone who actually knows what they're talking about cringe. Take it easy, lol)
> It doesn't make sense to make blanket statements about "the drugs" when psychiatric drugs differ widely in this regard. > I'd be cautious of taking advice from anyone who makes blanket statements about "the drugs". This is bordering on uninformed anti-psychiatry. Yeah, as someone who has been close to people who need antipsychotics, I sometimes feel the anti-antidepressant crowd extrapolates to all psychiatric drug…
I am not anti-antidepressant, or drugs in general. Bipolar people get huge benefit from their medications. And their families! The ones I know also say there are times they miss the emotional highs. It's probably why they (and schizophrenics) go non-compliant.
I think it's different for a lot of people. But one common thing is to get grandiose and think that all problems are with other people. Why would such a person need meds? Clearly there is something wrong with the person who might suggest that.
Then potentially add paranoia on top of that...
Edit: and as the sibling comment said, people can feel pretty shitty on them. I know I've heard and been sympathetic to that for many years, so don't want to sound insensitive by only focusing on anosognosia.
Don't take it personal. Both things can be true, you can have adhd and adhd can be overdiagnosed, doesn't mean that none of those diagnostics are valid. I'm sure you must be tired of people telling you about how overdiagnosed adhd is, I'm sorry about that, but don't take it personal, it's just a person on the internet.
GP also claimed the treatment is extremely suspect yet provided nothing to back up the claim. Does GP think the treatment does not work? AFAIK it is among the most treatable psychiatric illnesses.
doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.5335
> Findings
> In this systematic scoping review of 334 published studies in children and adolescents, convincing evidence was found that ADHD is overdiagnosed in children and adolescents. For individuals with milder symptoms in particular, the harms associated with an ADHD diagnosis may often outweigh the benefits.
What I mean is that we feed children Ritalin without a second thought. It's absolute nuts. There are many many ways to work with ADHD which doesn't require giving a children meds. We should be way more cautious about doing that.
Completely agree with you, although I think that "going outside and taking a multivitamin" is an inadequate substitute for "live inside a prosperous, functional human-shaped society".
It's not society. It actually starts with the individual. In order to have nay kind of decent society, each individual needs to recognize that they are responsible for themselves and their own society. Going outside, exercising and consuming nourishing foods are the literal starting place. Then seek to find things you like doing and become competent in them. Find a good wife or husband. Don't cheat on them. Don't tak…
While this is true in terms of finding a solution to depression, I do think that the societal norms of our society are extremely conducive to these sort of depressive behaviors. E.g. many societies are setup to make these kinds of behaviors (self isolation, dopamine seeking hedonic treadmill type behavior, etc) very difficult to engage in without being chastised
There's a significant population of science denying cranks and so those who want to raise legit concerns about the quality and alas, often motivation of medical studies are easily grouped with those. But: 1. There's no such thing as good / bad cholesterol. This is complete baloney and Pfizer lost a staggering amount of money when a drug raising good cholesterol got as far as human trials -- and failed them. There is…
> The diagnosis and treatment of ADHD in adults but most especially in children is extremely suspect. Go on… (I’m adult diagnosed, for disclosure, but please do go on and tell me how suspect my diagnosis was, how I shouldn’t have been diagnosed as a child, how my medication is harmful. Go on and tell me about my life which you know better than I do.)
I think OP is just saying that 'ADHD' is not that valid of a diagnosis, in terms of any kind of underlying 'pathology'. The fact that many people appear to benefit from the use of 'medication' (i.e. amphetamines and derivatives, from Adderall to Desoxyn(methamphetamine) to Ritalin), is mostly unrelated to any 'diagnosis'.
Personally I think all drugs should be legal and people should be able to take whatever they think helps them, although I always recommend the 'less is more' mentality and would urge people not to develop dependencies.