PSYCHIATRIC INFORMATION

Proving psychiatry’s failure the New York Times today ran an article describing how psychiatrists have oversold the idea that brain imaging scans can somehow prove the existence of their many theoretical diseases. The NY Times reports: “After almost 30 years, researchers have not developed any standardized tool for diagnosing or treating psychiatric disorders based on imaging studies.” and “imaging technology has not lived up to the hopes invested in it in the 1990’s - labeled the “Decade of the Brain” by the American Psychiatric Association”.

In a description that sounded more like a dungeon torture chamber this article covers the horrific abuse of patients in psychiatric hospitals in Turkey. The story also quoted a report investigating these human rights violations. The report included such comments as:

“Investigators observed children emaciated from starvation,” and “Staff reported children dying from starvation and dehydration.”

Patients are “subjected to treatment practices that are tantamount to torture,”

The group said electric shock therapy were “massively overused in Turkish psychiatric facilities in cases for which there is no clinically proven justification,” and that they were used as a form of punishment.

This has become a high profile issue recently due to a news article about the foster parents who were allegedly advised by a psychiatrist to keep their children in cages. This should come as no surprise though - putting children in cages as a form of treatment has been in use by psychiatry for over 200 years. Rather than actually curing patients psychiatric hospitals often just sedate patients with drugs, restrain them or lock them up.

In a time of loss and destruction some people will try to take advantage of the weak and needy. The hurricane Katrina victims are about to find this out first hand. I have been recently seeing media reports that psychiatry and the big drug companies are gearing up to dish out millions of dollars of “free” psychiatric care and harmful psychiatric drugs to help “treat” the victims. Ultimately what the victims will discover once hooked on these powerful mind altering drugs is that the side effects (like suicide and psychosis) are awful and withdrawal from them is almost impossible.

(OPENPRESS) September 4, 2005 — The psychiatric profession purports to be the sole arbiter on the subject of mental health and “diseases” of the mind. However, psychiatric “disordersâ€? are not medical diseases and psychiatrists admit in their own literature that they have no idea how the mind works.

In medicine, strict criteria exist for calling a condition a disease: a predictable group of symptoms and the cause of the symptoms or an understanding of their physiology (function) must be proven and established. Chills and fever are symptoms. Malaria and typhoid are diseases. Diseases are proven to exist by objective evidence and physical tests. Yet, no mental “diseases” have ever been proven to medically exist.

Antidepressants like Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft have been the big topic in the news lately. It seems that much of the scientific evidence showing the link between suicide and antidepressants has been being kept secret by the big drug companies like Glaxo Smith Kline, Eli Lilly and Pfizer.

I guess I could see why… Who wants to tell their customers: “Not only do our drugs make you fat and kill your sex drive, but they also make you want to kill yourself”!

I’m glad to see more sensible advice being given in the media when it comes to taking antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs. Many people are so quick to turn to these powerful mind altering drugs like Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft. Because the pharmaceutical companies have spent billions of dollars on marketing to doctors and publicity campaigns to the public - it is a common misconception that these drugs are needed to “cure” anxiety and depression. Even many doctors are falsely convinced that there are “chemical imbalances” causing these problems. After all, you hear about it in the media all the time… right? The facts are: psychiatry and the big drug companies have yet to even produce scientific evidence proving that the chemical imbalances even exist! So exactly what are these drugs (and all their side effects) needed for?

A great commentary by Kathie Zatkin that I found today in the Berkeley Daily Planet has some great points. She covers the FDA, big drug companies and their deep pockets, the failure of doctors and psychiatrists to adequately inform their patients on the risks of psychiatric drugs and the growing mountain of evidence that not only are drugs like antidepressants extremely harmful, but they barely work any more effectively than a sugar pill. All of these great points. Some excerpts from her commentary:

It is alleged that her 37 year old neighbor and friend murdered this grandmother after being given psychiatric “treatment” for depression.

Apparently, the two were good friends prior to the attack and it was quite unexpected. This sounds very familiar to me… a person ends up being treated for depression by being prescribed an antidepressant and then commits horrible acts of violence on people who are their friends or relatives. The article doesn’t explicitly say which drug he was on, but my observation in these matters points to antidepressant side effects. Especially in the light of the mountain of evidence being published about these drugs causing suicidal thoughts and violence.

While browsing the news today, I learned of a new side effect from psychiatric drugs like antidepressants (Prozac, Zoloft & Paxil), Zyprexa, Risperdal and other drugs prescribed for psychiatric reasons. That side effect is weight gain. Apparently, in some cases, drastic weight gain (to the tune of over 100 pounds). Yesterday, the New York Times has pointed this out in an article about some drugs causing weight gain.

While this is a minor side effect when compared to death, suicide and psychosis - I nonetheless thought I should point this out.