Psych bible turns sorrow into sickness
POSTED BY: Magonsdaughter
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 6, 2011 21:46
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Psychiatry bible 'turns sorrow into sickness'
Jill Stark
December 4, 2011
IT'S been branded a ''dangerous public experiment'' that could turn normal human experiences into an epidemic of mental illness with healthy people being drugged unnecessarily.
In radical changes to the way mental health conditions are diagnosed, what was once considered a child's temper tantrum could be labelled ''disruptive mood dysregulation disorder''. If a widow grieves for more than a fortnight she might be diagnosed with ''major depressive disorder''.
If a mother in a custody battle tries to turn a child against the father, it might create ''parental alienation disorder''.
These are among new conditions proposed for the fifth edition of the psychiatrist's bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), due to be finalised next year.
Some doctors in Australia are arguing the revised manual - used globally to diagnose mental disorders - is pathologising unhappiness.
The changes have also caused an international outcry, with the American Counselling Association, American Psychological Association, the British Psychological Society and others calling for the draft of the new edition to be independently reviewed.
They fear it is so inclusive, it risks labelling millions of healthy people as mentally ill.
''It's such a narrow and limited view of human experience, to want to reduce every bit of suffering to medical diagnosis,'' said Jon Jureidini, professor of psychiatry at the University of Adelaide. He said the changes would lead to increased prescribing.
The authors say ''misinformation'' about the manual, produced by the American Psychiatric Association since 1952, is creating unnecessary fear and any inclusions will be based on robust scientific evidence. Psychiatrist Ian Hickie, director of Sydney University's Brain and Mind Research Institute, rejects claims that the new manual would medicalise unhappiness. ''When people are in pain and suffering elsewhere we don't say people are pathologising that. We say, let's try and do the best we can to relieve that and get them back to function in the appropriate way,'' Professor Hickie said.
The rift reflects division within the mental health community over a global rise in the use of antidepressants, stimulants and antipsychotics, with many clinicians critical of drugs with potentially serious side effects being favoured over more costly talk-based therapies. Others argue that medication can be life-saving where other therapies have failed. The inclusion of conditions such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism in previous DSM editions is believed to have contributed to increased prescribing.
In the new edition, the diagnosis threshold for some existing disorders is also being lowered so that grief over the death of a loved one can qualify as a major depressive illness.
The authors of DSM-5, however, argue that a bereaved person who is suffering from major depression is currently ineligible for that diagnosis, preventing them from getting help if they need it.
''A broad range of evidence … shows that there are little to no systematic differences between individuals who develop a major depression in response to bereavement and in response to other severe stressors - such as being … raped … or the loss of your treasured job,'' Dr Kenneth Kendler, a member of the DSM-5 mood disorders group, said.
The changes also mean children only have to display six of 13 possible symptoms for a diagnosis of ADHD, compared with six of nine in the previous manual.
''Under the new criteria it's almost harder not to get diagnosed with ADHD than it is to get diagnosed with it,'' Martin Whitely, a West Australian Labor MP and anti-ADHD medication campaigner, said. ''There were about 60,000 Australian children on ADHD medicatiNOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Thank you for this. This has been a problem for some time (four previous editions at least)
I've railed against this sort of thing before, but I think the author has a point and it would interesting to see if, in fact, this could be carried to it's logical extreme:
If we took the DSM-5 and applied it to a random sampling of the population, could we diagnose everyone in our sample with some form of mental illness?
My guess is we could, and leads me to wonder if this is by design. If so, then you can have a full on FFF RWED brawl about whether it's the corporate profiteers or MKULTRA 
That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.
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I was kind of hoping for a discussion, not a brawl
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Well, I ain't likely to brawl with y'all, most of ya, about it, but there will be brawl.
Overdiagnosis is as bad as underdiagnosis, and getting a proper, vetted, unbiased diagnosis in this day and age is a real problem with a broken medical care system which has incestous links with Big Pharma right down to the displays and posters in your local doctors office.
Believe me, I know - one might recall that the primary thing that nearly screwed things up and left me hanging again recently was the doctors refusing to listen to the patient and screwing the diagnosis up via bias and incompetence, were it not for one having enough of a mad science bent to listen and read my medical files, I might not be here.
So yeah, this sorta thing annoys the hell outta me, and I wonder just how much of that they let Big Pharma ghost-write for them, follow the money, as always.
That's also why I am a fan of CCHRINT, although I don't necessarily always agree with em.
http://www.cchrint.org/
Also still fighting that whole Godboldo mess, next hearing is Dec 12th - the hardest part is keeping them in the dark about our involvement cause I'd rather not have them dragged into our fight, they got enough on their own plates.
-Frem
I do not serve the Blind God.
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''The DSM-5 is used in real life-and-death decisions - it shouldn't be a set of hypotheses to be tested,'' he said. ''The worst outcome of this would be all these suggestions get included and a lot of people get medicine they don't need. But an almost equally bad outcome would be that psychiatry gets so tarred by this aberration that people who really need psychiatry and need the medicine stop taking it.''
This is true of both psychiatry and medical doctors. I've gotten so much bad advice and negative help from traditional doctors that my first inclination now is to doubt them, rather than trust that they know what the hell they're talking about.
I'll go to a traditional doctor to get a bone set, and occasionally for stitches (though I did my own last time), but that's about it.
Not likely to go to a shrink for any reason at all, simply because doing so is more and more likely to result in you getting some sort of scarlet letter on your permanent record. ;)
"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill
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Okay, if ya want it, here's my analysis, but fair warning, it's a little abstract and conspiratorial.
Pharma isn't about medicine, and it's not about money, not directly, it's not about control, not directly.
Pharma is a bank. Bank of issue, international finance. They mint money in their own currency system. This money is deflationary, because you eat it. This makes it abnormally strong as a currency. Its status, in its many forms, is variable, so it can go legit, be devalued and go "generic" go "off-label" and get more wider circulation or it can go "illicit" and become a black market currency, kicking back up its value. It's a very complex currency system, and very veratile, easily manipulated by its controller, Pharma, the bank of issue.
In order to get citizens, the nation of Pharma must first convince people of one of two things: Either that they need Pharma in their lives, or that Pharma coins, little colored disks made sugar, are actual money that can be traded, not just for cash, but for direct services or other Pharma coins of a different color.
Diagnosing everyone as sick makes everyone part of the system, so everyone gets the currency, and in so doing they set up the international exchange rate, between the global parasitic nation of Pharma, and their host nation. Pharma can set this rate of exchange through manipulation of governments, medical providers and insurance companies.
Once Pharma is freely exchangeable for other currencies, it's ability to penetrate the world market is assured, and its issuers can mint money at will, and demand human labor in exchange, per the basis of economics. There's really no limit to the amount of Pharma coins or pills that can be minted, because the number in circulation will always be falling, and the number of citizens purchasing or trading them will always be increasing.
That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.
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I love going through the DSM. I usually end up diagnosing myself with lots of stuff, aolthough the same can be said for a medical dictionary. Which is why lay people shouldn't diagnose.
I think some diagnosis are useful. If it means you get a treatment plan, or some way of relieving your suffering, or some insight into your/your loved ones behaviour/condition then that is great. If it leaves a person, especially a child feeling stigmatised and or pathologised, and no good comes of it, then it is not good.
Number 5 has gone too far.
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Which is why lay people shouldn't diagnose.
Disagree. I figured out my heart condition wasn't a heart condition at all, no thanks to idiot doctors unable to pick up on the obvious signs and symptoms, and who thought it was pathological or lack of exercise.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precordial_catch_syndrome
Screw them. It was an obvious diagnosis, and if they couldn't even get that, I seriously question their so called "expertise."
I was also able to correctly diagnose my L5 herniated disk with associated sciatica, which I did confirm with an MRI, and determined that I didn't need surgery to correct it. I was also able to diagnose my grandmother's vascular dementia and thrombosis, the only surprise there was the possible lung cancer, which wasn't really a surprise because she smoked two packs a day for twenty years.
Essentially, if you're literate and discerning, there's not really anything a doctor can tell you that you can't find out on your own.
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If the problem is getting help to people who need it the answer is changing how people can get help. Not changing your measurement methods.
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