Posted by Eric on March 26, 2001, at 11:19:10
In reply to New theories of mental disorders needed (long), posted by JasonL on March 25, 2001, at 18:15:06
> I too am one of the treatment resistent folks out there. This whole thing is so frustrating to me. How is that some people can just be happier, more possitive than others?
>
>Jason, unfortunately the future is rather bleak when it comes to the area of serious research for psychiatric diseases. Sure, there is some real research going on here and there but it is miniscule compared to what needs to be going on. Mental illness has always been given lipservice by the medical community. It has only been in the last fifteen years or so since the advent of the new generation of psychiatry drugs that began with Prozac have mentally ill people been given a real shot at life. Prior to the new modern class meds such as the SSRIs and atypical anti-psychotics, medications were very crude, dirty and full of nasty side effects.
Psychiatry is still too mired in its bleak past, being rooted in the social science of psychology. And not being based upon more mainstream medical science as other branches of medicine are. This is the main reason why there is not much research going on, because of the perception by most that psychiatric diseases are not "real" diseases but are in fact mere psychological problems, "its all in your head" etc. The diseases we suffer with(major depression, manic depression, schizophrenia, etc.) are still not truly recognized as medical problems unto themselves...most likely severe forms of mental illness are neurological diseases of the brain or perhaps neuro-endocrine diseases.
Eventually, the problem with mental illness will probably get solved. However I fear it will be a long time from now, probably about the time I am in old age and about ready to croak from natural causes. Maybe a hundred years from now things will be much better for the mentally ill. But for now, as in the past, things are pretty shitty and of low quality of life for the severely mentally ill.
Much of the reason is simple...psychiatry is rooted in psychology and psychology aint real medicine. Psychology is not real science. Its as simple as that. Its time to rethink the entire business of mental illness, but getting others to believe this is hard to do because of misconceptions about these problems.
Eric
poster:Eric
thread:57508
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20010319/msgs/57574.html