Depression

INTRODUCTION According to its About page, "The ENIGMA consortium is an international effort by leaders worldwide. The Consortium brings together researchers in imaging genomics, neurology and psychiatry, to understand brain structure and function, based on MRI, DTI [Diffusion Tensor Imaging], fMRI, genetic data and many patient populations. The best return on our research investments will come from combining our data to achieve the large samples necessary to detect the modest gene effect sizes that we now know are the rule rather [than] the exception for complex traits. ...

"For e'en tho' vanquished, he could argue still;" From The Deserted Village (1770) by Oliver Goldsmith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . On June 23, 2020, Awais Aftab, MD, psychiatrist, published an interview with Ronald Pies, MD, also a psychiatrist, in Psychiatric Times. The interview was titled The Battle for the Soul of Psychiatry: Ronald W. Pies, MD. I critiqued Dr. Pies' responses here. In the light of a more recent publication by Dr. Pies, I would like to recall some comments concerning the notorious chemical imbalance deception that the learned doctor made in the earlier interview. ...

 Everyone has their own story, some fortunate, some less so. Mine is a story of abuse, neglect and mental illness, and the long road back. I offer it for whatever hope and guidance it may provide for others currently suffering. Me, A Victim In 1956 when I was thirteen and starting in middle school, my mother had the first of her several operations for intestinal cancer. She told me that she had “tumors,” but that meant one thing to me— cancer. Around the same time, I, too, began having stomach pains along with constipation like hers. I always had problems getting along with other kids, being teased and harassed, and being nervous, and now I was in great distress. ...

On May 16, 2018, the prestigious and venerable psychiatrist Allen Frances, MD, gave an interview to Christiane Amanpour on CNN. You can see the video here. It’s titled How Antidepressant Withdrawal “Can Trap People”. Here’s how the interview opened: CA: "So you know, I just wanted to start by saying that who knew that antidepressants were addictive. It's not what you associate with things like antidepressants. You think of pain-killers, obviously, and drugs and alcohol, and cigarettes." ...

INTRODUCTION The bereavement exclusion was formally eliminated in the spring of 2013, with the publication of DSM-5. The exclusion was a provision in earlier editions, that a “diagnosis of major depressive disorder” could not be assigned to a bereaved person, even though he or she met the criteria, unless certain additional considerations were met. The history of its elimination provides an interesting example of psychiatry’s relentless expansion of its net. The issues involved take us right to the heart of the psychiatric hoax. ...

On January 10, 2017, I put up a post titled The Biological Evidence for “Mental Illness”. It was published simultaneously on Mad in America. The post was a response to an earlier comment from Carolina Partners in Mental Healthcare PLLC, which included the assertion “mental illnesses have a long history of biological evidence.” In my January 10 article, I challenged this assertion and pointed out that no such evidence existed. The article generated some comments, most of which were favorable. There was one comment, however, from Michael, who asserted: ...

On January 2, 2017, I published a short post titled Carrie Fisher Dead at Age 60 on Behaviorism and Mental Health. The article was published simultaneously on Mad in America. On January 4, a response from Carolina Partners was entered into the comments string on both sites. Carolina Partners in Mental Healthcare, PLLC, is a large psychiatric group practice based in North Carolina. According to their website, they comprise 14 psychiatrists, 7 psychologists, 34 Advanced Practice Nurse Practitioners/Physicians Assistants, and 43 Therapists and Counselors. They have 27 North Carolina locations. ...

On May 7, Allen Frances, MD, posted an article on the HuffPost site. The piece was titled Antidepressants Work, But Only For Really Depressed People. Superficially, the article presents itself as a call to limit the prescribing of the so-called antidepressant drugs to severe cases; but the piece can, I suggest, be more accurately characterized as Dr. Frances’s latest attempt to distance himself, and psychiatry in general, from the pill-peddling frenzy that has characterized the profession for the past thirty or forty years ...

On March 24, 2015, a twenty-seven-year-old German pilot named Andreas Lubitz flew an Airbus A 320 into a French mountainside, killing himself and the 149 other people on board. Mr. Lubitz was co-piloting the flight, and he caused the aircraft to crash by locking the pilot out of the flight deck and setting the autopilot to descend to 100 feet. During the descent, he was contacted by civilian and military traffic controllers, and by the crew of another aircraft, but he made no response. He also ignored repeated and increasingly urgent requests from the captain to be readmitted to the flight deck. ...

In their January 2016 issue, the journal Social Science and Medicine published Unequal depression for equal work? How the wage gap explains gendered disparities in mood disorders, by Jonathan Platt, MPH, Seth Prins, PhD candidate, Lisa Bates, PhD, and Katherine Keyes, PhD, MPH. All the authors work at Columbia’s Department of Public Health. Here’s the abstract: "Mood disorders, such as depression and anxiety, are more prevalent among women than men. This disparity may be partially due to the effects of structural gender discrimination in the work force, which acts to perpetuate gender differences in opportunities and resources and may manifest as the gender wage gap. We sought to quantify and operationalize the wage gap in order to explain the gender disparity in depression and anxiety disorders, using data from a 2001-2002 US nationally representative survey of 22,581 working adults ages 30-65. Using established Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition methods to account for gender differences in individual-level productivity, our models reduced the wage gap in our sample by 13.5%, from 54% of men's pay to 67.5% of men's pay. We created a propensity-score matched sample of productivity indicators to test if the direction of the wage gap moderated the effects of gender on depression or anxiety. Where female income was less than the matched male counterpart, odds of both disorders were significantly higher among women versus men (major depressive disorder OR: 2.43, 95% CI: 1.95-3.04; generalized anxiety disorder OR: 4.11, 95% CI: 2.80-6.02). Where female income was greater than the matched male, the higher odds ratios for women for both disorders were significantly attenuated (Major Depressive Disorder OR: 1.20; 95% CI: 0.96-1.52) (Generalized Anxiety Disorder OR: 1.5; 95% CI: 1.04-2.29). The test for effect modification by sex and wage gap direction was statistically significant for both disorders. Structural forms of discrimination may explain mental health disparities at the population level. Beyond prohibiting overt gender discrimination, policies must be created to address embedded inequalities in procedures surrounding labor markets and compensation in the workplace." ...