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Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

blogs.scientificamerican.com

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Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#51

Post by vonmoltke »

alleychnt wrote: post #42
warfangle wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

o/ heya. I've been on psychiatrist-prescribed meds for a little over two years now. I've gotten a better job, my salary has increased by 52%, I live with less stress, I have a (mostly) tidy home, I am no longer dependent on alcohol, I care for a wonderful dog, I am cultivating healthy relationships and friendships, and I am more involved in my community. I've also been seeing a cognitive-behavioral therapist for abou…

and as soon as you go off the meds?

What does that have to do with anything? Some conditions are incurable, only treatable.

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#52

Post by [deleted] »

warfangle wrote: post #26
alleychnt wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Show me a guy on psych meds who is doing great and I'll believe you.

o/ heya. I've been on psychiatrist-prescribed meds for a little over two years now. I've gotten a better job, my salary has increased by 52%, I live with less stress, I have a (mostly) tidy home, I am no longer dependent on alcohol, I care for a wonderful dog, I am cultivating healthy relationships and friendships, and I am more involved in my community. I've also been seeing a cognitive-behavioral therapist for abou…

[deleted]

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#53

Post by Sone7 »

vonmoltke wrote: post #45
intopieces wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your profession needs no help from marsrover to find itself under the wheels of a bus. Every other medical revolution -- such as the rise of antibiotics, the pioneering of complex surgeries, and the advancements in medical imaging -- have resulted in a net reduction of people suffering from the ailments those tools are involved in treating. Not so with psychiatry. The more drugs that are developed, the more illnesses…

> You'll have to excuse the skepticism of some us who have seen loved ones suffer through debilitating, sometimes permanent side effects from drugs their psychiatrists prescribed. What debilitating side effects are those? How does their frequency compare to side effects for non-psychiatric drugs and treatments?

Don't do that. You can look up the debilitating side effects yourself. Asking someone to re-live watching their loved one lose their self from benzos or anti-psychotics that were prescribed as a first measure rather than a last resort - which Does happen, and far too often - is crueler than you know.

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#54

Post by nommm-nommm »

alleychnt wrote: post #42
warfangle wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

o/ heya. I've been on psychiatrist-prescribed meds for a little over two years now. I've gotten a better job, my salary has increased by 52%, I live with less stress, I have a (mostly) tidy home, I am no longer dependent on alcohol, I care for a wonderful dog, I am cultivating healthy relationships and friendships, and I am more involved in my community. I've also been seeing a cognitive-behavioral therapist for abou…

and as soon as you go off the meds?

WTF does this mean?

If you go off your HIV meds you get AIDS and die. If you stay on your HIV meds you have a life expectancy is similar to someone who does not have the virus. (1)

Do you then conclude HIV meds are bad? Or HIV patients need to just suck it up?

(1) http://www.spectator.co.uk/2014/04/why-id-rather-have-hiv-th...

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#55

Post by [deleted] »

alleychnt wrote: post #42
warfangle wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

o/ heya. I've been on psychiatrist-prescribed meds for a little over two years now. I've gotten a better job, my salary has increased by 52%, I live with less stress, I have a (mostly) tidy home, I am no longer dependent on alcohol, I care for a wonderful dog, I am cultivating healthy relationships and friendships, and I am more involved in my community. I've also been seeing a cognitive-behavioral therapist for abou…

and as soon as you go off the meds?

[deleted]

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#56

Post by warfangle »

alleychnt wrote: post #42
warfangle wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

o/ heya. I've been on psychiatrist-prescribed meds for a little over two years now. I've gotten a better job, my salary has increased by 52%, I live with less stress, I have a (mostly) tidy home, I am no longer dependent on alcohol, I care for a wonderful dog, I am cultivating healthy relationships and friendships, and I am more involved in my community. I've also been seeing a cognitive-behavioral therapist for abou…

and as soon as you go off the meds?

I've learned coping skills to help me deal with what I take the meds for - coping skills that I could not practice / get good at while I was not being treated. I'm not as good as I am when I'm on them, but I'm a whole lot better than I used to be. (How do I know? I take regular doctor-sanctioned drug holidays. Luckily the meds I take do not need to be tapered.)

But you don't really care about that. Or any valid piece of evidence that disputes your already-formed opinion.

I used to be really against psychiatry too. Had docs in high school that didn't ask the right questions. Got misdiagnosed. Spent my 20s a shambling (semi-functional, but shambling) mess.

I'm privileged that I'm able to afford my mental healthcare team (neither of them take insurance). I wish access to quality mental health professionals was more easy to obtain. It's a double edged sword- the practice has a hard time recruiting, and health insurance is often pretty terrible for it. So many people who would benefit from a mental health provider cannot / will not get it.

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#57

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

marsrover wrote: post #2

The last Psychiatrist I went to prescribed me 4mg of Klonopin a day for anxiety. The one before that prescribed me 40-50mg of Adderall a day for ADHD and about 600mg of Seroquel a night for sleeping problems. Both times I decided to quit going and tapered myself off. There never really asked how I felt or seemed to care about me in any way shape or form. Just, "Here's your drugs, see you next month." I have a horribl…

They run to the meds first for the nice freebies the drug reps give out for their best dea..../prescribers.

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#58

Post by notoes »

intopieces wrote: post #25
phren0logy wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry this has been your experience, but please don't throw my entire profession under the bus because of it.

Your profession needs no help from marsrover to find itself under the wheels of a bus. Every other medical revolution -- such as the rise of antibiotics, the pioneering of complex surgeries, and the advancements in medical imaging -- have resulted in a net reduction of people suffering from the ailments those tools are involved in treating. Not so with psychiatry. The more drugs that are developed, the more illnesses…

> Your profession needs no help from marsrover to find itself under the wheels of a bus.

HN comment of the day :)

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#59

Post by gonehome »

phren0logy wrote: post #21

I'm a psychiatrist. It is always amazing to me that despite four years of medical school, six years of residency and fellowships, and four board certifications, the assumption is that I have no idea what I'm talking about and have evil motives. There are fair criticisms of psychiatry, there are bad psychiatrists, but mostly there are crappy generalizations. Good psychiatrists have an understanding of what medications…

I think part of the difficulty is that we don't have a great understanding of consciousness or how the mind actually works. It feels a bit like medicine prior to germ theory.

Even for relatively more understood things like depression it's not like we can test the serotonin levels to validate it before SSRIs and then check them after.

It seems to be a mixture of this seems to work, but given the high variation among people and general complexity of mental states the science is difficult.

Re: Can Psychiatry Turn Itself Around?

#60

Post by pc2g4d »

Psychiatry's trouble is that it tries to treat emotional problems using drugs.

That's also the entire point of psychiatry.

It's in a crisis because "stabilizing" people by numbing their brains does nothing to help them face their problems. A profession of cleaners whose main technique was to sweep everything under the rug would also face crisis at some point.

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