Posted by med_empowered on February 22, 2005, at 19:52:20 [reposted on February 22, 2005, at 21:11:53 | original URL]
In reply to Re: Weaning off Seroquel, posted by linkadge on February 22, 2005, at 19:39:43
hey! I don't think this poster is schizophrenic...the doses of seroquel would indicate that its being used as a sleep aid, in which case there may be other alternatives.
As for neuroletpics as a treatment for schizophrenia...
My concern is that, without evidence that schizophrenia is in fact a true "brain disease," we have abandoned the potential for other treatments...drug, non-drug, whatever. This is a big deal when you also consider the side-effects of neuroleptics, new and old. My other problem is that neuroleptics haven't done so great a job...even schizophrenia experts readily admit that only 1/3 of treated patients are "much improved," 1/3 are "improved", and a full third stay about the same. There's no reason to abandon research into the biology of schizophrenia, but there's also no reason to shelter this research from hardcore scrutiny OR abandon other alternatives. If we are seriuos about helping these people, then we should be serious about improving lives--not just "treating disease".
poster:med_empowered
thread:462032
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/wdrawl/20050214/msgs/462035.html