| The book, "Anatomy of an Epidemic", provides a really comprehensive look at how we ended up in this situation. Some of the keys here: 1) A desire to bring a level of "science" to a part of our physiology we don't understand. The thinking here is that while we do not understand the etiology of depression, we can at minimum begin to use blunt tools to solve problems. The issue as anyone who has studied complex systems understands, is that the feedback loops are so dense, there is no method to understand what is happening. 2) Financialization of treatment – drugs make more money than therapy and other methods. Or to use an HN phrase, drugs are more easily scaled to the population than other methods. The incentives throughout the entire system push people this direction, regardless of the underlying research. 3) Treatment doesn't happen instantly in any case. The issue with much of the research today is that we take a very limited time window to evaluate the efficacy of different treatments. If, instead, we looked at treatment over the life course, the results are often radically different. This is where startups like Seven Cups of Tea will hopefully play the world. This mental health crisis offers a huge opportunity for disruption and creativity. As a quote in the Stanford alumni magazine said this month: "One hundred years from now, people will look back at the age of giving SSRIs and they will have a reputation that's akin to bloodletting."[1] [1] http://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?articl... |
Confer:
http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2006/11/massacre_of_the_unico...
http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/01/the_massacre_of_the_u...