DSM "has outlasted its usefulness"

Newscientist article on the future of the DSM and mental diagnosis

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2 ... unced.html

HaxX wrote:Newscientist article on the future of the DSM and mental diagnosis

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23487-psychiatry-divided-as-mental-health-bible-denounced.html

Cool, its by Allen Frances.

"Allen J. Frances, MD (born 1942) is an American psychiatrist best known for chairing the Task Force that produced the fourth revision of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-IV) and for his critique of the current version, DSM-5. He warns that the expanding boundary of psychiatry is causing a diagnostic inflation that is swallowing up normality and that the over-treatment of the 'worried well' is distracting attention from the core mission of treating the more severely ill." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Frances

Psychiatry’s diagnostic criteria are literally voted into existence and inserted into the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM). What is voted in is a system of classification of symptoms that is drastically different from, and foreign to, anything in medicine.

So many people get confused by this thinking that a DSM billing code is a biological explanation for what they "have".

I am still reading the article.

-- Mon May 06, 2013 5:46 pm --

I notice in this article they use they term "circuits" and have read this before in the AMA definition of addiction. Circuits instead of chemical imbalances, it makes more sense.

The article states.

The approach is based on the idea that mental disorders are biological problems involving brain circuits that dictate specific patterns of cognition, emotion and behaviour. Concentrating on treating these problems, rather than symptoms is hoped to provide a better outlook for patients.

I am a fan of this page,

How the DSM Harms People by spreading the Disease model. http://dsm5sucks.com/

But moving away from the chemical imbalance theory that is a drug marketing tool, to brain "circuits" is a big improvement.

A link from the above page above leads here,

"The DSM-5 adds many new and untested diagnoses so many more people will get psychiatric labels. Paula Kaplan has thoroughly documented stories of people harmed by psychiatric labels."

Thats here http://psychdiagnosis.net/psychiatric_stories.html

I should send my story to this site.

Please remember the advertisement rule of this site:
anti-psych/topic109290.html

Posting links without a discussion about them is considered advertisement.

In other remarks, this is a huge gain for the antipsych community, as well as the mental health community as a whole.

My main concern in regards to the "faulty circuits" idea is that it will turn into a modern kind of phreneology whereby symptoms are still labeled as diseases. A lot of things can change circuits (neuropathways) in someones brain. Hormonal problems, severe stress like a traumatic event or combat stress, drug abuse etc.
I hate the DSM with a passion but I am suspicious of this change. Also considering what a cash cow the DSM has been I dont think it would be discarded without a profitable substitute.

Psychology Today isn't thrilled:

"True, the NIMH is leaving some room for discussion of environmental and psychological factors. “Self-reports” will also apparently be a “unit of analysis,” though interest in the thoughts and testament of patients seems characteristically small. The agency’s overwhelming focus is to remain on the brain as the alleged seat and cause of psychiatric suffering."

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sid ... port-dsm-5

This is what I don't understand, and perhaps many of you who have researched this much more than myself will be able to answer. If environmental factors can turn on and off certain genes, isn't it also plausible that it could do so to cause "faulty circuits" or whatever they want to call it which then cause extreme emotional distress/mental illness? So in this sense wouldn't it still be correct to say that the brain is the seat of psychiatric suffering? And who's to say that even if it is the brain that we can't also use environmental factors to turn off some of these "faulty circuits" or the genes that are causing these "faulty circuits"? Or am I just confusing myself?

Cheze2 wrote:environmental factors

environmental factors are everything.

This was the first link I clicked on when I did a search "islolation + insanity".

Lonely Madness: The Effects of Solitary Confinement and Social Isolation on Mental and Emotional Health http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/1898

Most people already know being alone drives people crazy, Cast Away is a 2000 drama film directed by Robert Zemeckis and starring Tom Hanks as a FedEx employee stranded on an uninhabited island after his plane crashes in the South Pacific.

During a first attempt to make fire, Chuck receives a deep wound to his hand. In anger he throws several objects, including a Wilson Sporting Goods volleyball from one of the packages. A short time later he draws a face in the bloody hand print on the ball, names it Wilson and begins talking to it. Four years later Chuck has regular conversations and arguments with Wilson.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cast_Away

I have spent to much time around people labelled mentally ill to believe anything biological psychiatry says anymore cause these people are as normal as anyone else, they tell me they "have" depression , bipolar , ADD/ADHD and anxiety ... and there psychiatric drug history , some of the stories are as bad as mine.

I also know people who have had no contact with the psychiatric profession who are sad about the things in life the are currently facing, others who are sad alot but get up and go and from time to time are in very good moods, I know people who get angry really easy and a few people who hate sitting still and are always on the go from one thing to another. Many people I know are shy in social situations and like to drink a few beers to talk more if they go on a date.

The only thing that makes a person mentally ill these days is going to a psychiatrist or even a GP and complaining of any feeling you don't like and/or reading about symptoms and labels and getting caught up in the scientific sounding but fraudulent thing that is todays psychiatry and taking drugs that usually don't help but lead to more drugs and labels.

This DSM and giving everyone a label and dangerous drugs is out of hand, off the hook, insane !

Cheze2, I feel the problem is the perspective.
The "chemical imabalance" and Faulty circuits" approach is kind of like having a patient with a bullet wound to the leg and saying that the problem is the leg, and blaming the leg for all the suffering the patient has. "its the leg thats faulty, thats why you are in pain" while this is technicaly true because the leg has nerves, no one would pretend that the blame lies with the leg.

Mental illness is a stress response in most people, that is why it is so much more common in people below the poverty line and those who have suffered physical and mental abuse. Environmental factors are the biggest contributor to mental illness, this is why it is so important to take into account the patient's expieriences, which the DSM, the "chemichal imbalance" theory and "faulty circuit" theory ignore.

As an example combat stress has been shown to alter the fuctioning of the immune system, soldiers who have seen combat are more likely to have high levels of autoantibodies than undeployed, reserve soldiers. Of those with elevated autoantibodies there was a much higher risk of developing PTSD and other psychiatric illnesses. From this we can make a resonable conclusion:

Stress=Immune damage=mental illness

It also places all the blame on the brain, when the problem probably lies somewhere else in the body. Immune system abnormalities, hormonal problems and infections cause psychiatric suffering. The brain winds up being an innocent bystander.

An in regard to shutting of or activating certain genes, or groups of genes, this field is unfortunatly very new and lacks the funding it should have. I think it has a promising future though.

HaxX wrote:The "chemical imabalance" and Faulty circuits" approach is kind of like having a patient with a bullet wound to the leg and saying that the problem is the leg, and blaming the leg for all the suffering the patient has. "its the leg thats faulty, thats why you are in pain" while this is technicaly true because the leg has nerves, no one would pretend that the blame lies with the leg.

This makes wonderful sense. Thank you. I agree that the mental health world does need to take into account the experiences of the whole person. I'm going to have to look into this "faulty circuits" a little more I think.