What is the point of taking modern psychiatry seriously?

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In 20-30 years most of it is going to be in the same bin as phrenology. What is the point of taking what it says seriously? Where is the logic?

The main problems with modern psychology, people in the profession for the wrong reasons as well as a lot of conflict between psychiatry and the legal/economic system.

People who need help can't afford it, people who go to get help might end up being mis-treated by the mental health professionals they run into. So yeah its a bit behind were I would think it would be, but that can't be helped in such a system.

It's all guesswork with Psychiatrists. My last doctor (before I moved) was an MD, and he prescribed all my psych meds. He actually had a fairly good plan of action to find out what works for a patient, unlike every psychiatrist I've ever been to. He even wrote a book. My new doctor in the state I moved to won't give me one of the medications that I'd been on for years, because he says it contradicts one of my other meds. So I live my life in a fog. It's really starting to suck. I'm about to find another Dr. It's hard for me to get stuff like that done, though.

Probably the most important service psychiatry currently provides is leniency for crimes. Not always, but often enough that it has kept many people out of jail who would otherwise be (unfairly) in jail. That's reason enough to take it seriously. Psychiatry has countless flaws but I think it will mutate rather than disappearing. I see no reason to think that 30 years from now it will be retired like phrenology. It is serving too many social functions (many of them poorly, as Sweetleaf says) to disappear. But it needs to and will mutate.

Its some mutant child now for sure

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLrnkK2YEcE&ob=av3e[/youtube]

That's kind of what I advocate as an alternative, just seeing a regular MD who has some horse sense. Of course, it's each person's choice, but I think this is a perfectly reputable alternative.

Especially for such things as antidepressant medication where I've read that it's hit and miss, and thus trial and error in a reputable sense, anyway.
http://articles.latimes.com/2009/aug/03 ... ug-choice3
(And even for an antidepressant that doesn't seem to be working sometimes still important to phase down in stages.) http://articles.latimes.com/2009/aug/03 ... ing-drugs3

I wish you all the best in restablishing a combo of medication which works for you. You have a right to a second opinion or even third opinion. (They may contradict in a real, substantial way, or maybe just as an occasional long-shot side effect and he's being overly cautious, or there may be a way to monitor whether they're going to have a bad effect together.)

To get drugs.

Although I like my psyche. His office is as disorganised as my room.

I suppose an ADHD/ ASD psychiatrist is different from a talking-through-your-problems one.

I think psychiatrists rarely do therapy anymore. I've had more than one tell me they aren't concerned with diagnostics so much since so many conditions seem to blend into each other. One said to me, "Diagnostic labels are for insurance companies".They're more concerned with treating symptoms and yes, it can be guess work. The issue of my constant mental fatigue may be more of a processing issue rather than depression, for instance. Who knows? I'm already at the highest recommended dose for Zoloft and Strattera and I still struggle daily to function normally.

Because it generally involves venting and receiving drugs that damage/alter your personality years down the road.

People in Psychiatry/Psychology are human beings. No body is perfect, including them. A small percentage of them are bad people who prey upon their patients. More are in it for the wrong reasons, or are just inept at doing it. But there are some who do a fairly good job of helping people, so the profession should not be disregarded out of hand.

There is another factor to consider also. Psychiatry is not an exact science, so there is no way for a perfect outcome with every patient every time. Not enough is known or understood about the human brain and mind, and that is not likely to change for the foreseeable future. There are just too many variables. One perfect example of this is the Autism spectrum. No two cases are exactly alike, but there are enough points of shared symptomes to show a relationship along a spectrum of conditions. Also, there are several causative factors, which can be present alone or in combination--genetic, trauma, and environmental. Add in that treatment for each person has to be tailored for the individual because everybody is different, and you can get a good idea of how complicated psychiatry is.

The psych professionals, most of them anyway, are doing the best they can in a complicated and not fully understood medical arena.

What's the point of taking anything seriously

Psychology was founded by Sigmund Freud who himself committed suicide and had a rather colourful flamboyant life mired with lot of affairs.
Carl Jung connected spirituality, metaphysics and occult to heal problems his own mother was suffering from possession and researched it thoroughly and briefly lived in India to understand it.
About shock theraphy i have read it was discovered by accident when they noticed that in controlled condition pigs are electrocuted and then slaughtered it was easier to handle them.

Heh, well, we've moved on since Freud. My Perception prof (perception here referring to the psychological experience of sensory information) calls Freud "the F-word" and refuses to talk about him in class, because of how little he got right and how much he set psychology off-track for so long. You can credit Freud for popularizing psychology and for sparking a lot of other psychologists; but he really didn't contribute that much, and modern psychology knows it.

In modern psychology there's an almost anxious desire to make everything more concrete, more measurable. There's a lot of brain scans and tests with specific, exact scoring criteria. There's a lot of statistics, biology, and even physics (it's called "psychophysics" and has to do with how your experience of the world relates to the raw details of the world--things like mass vs. your experience of weight; velocity vs. your perception of movement). They're focusing on genetics and epigenetics, and trying to understand how development is different from person to person, with and without disorders.

I agree that we have a long, long way to go; but I wouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater here. Psychology has a lot of potential, and we've already done a good many useful things with it. We just have to stick with the science, be aware of our preconceptions, and plan experiments carefully, and we'll be okay.

It can be a Trojan Horse for corporate beasties, if you are unfortunately an unsuspecting and uneducated client of said 'industry'

medicating kids and stuff just shows how expensive and difficult good therapy is, or how rare good therapy is actually achieved

Most times crazies like us, are with nutty parents, living in dysfunctional societies, so no real gains can be realistically achieved as MENTAL AND EMOTIONAL DAMAGE is ONGOING ESPECIALLY FOR ASPIES..... but the meds make it all feel better anyways, INSTEAD OF REPAIRING OUR SOCIETIES to become more inclusive of difference

That alone will remedy many mental issues, including other difference groups that suffer like blacks, short people, but most clearly seen in cultural race issues affecting those to measurable increases in suicide, depression, crime and poverty.

I actually feel like the general public's faith in Psychiatry and conventional medicine is quite strong. What are you basing your statement on?

right born and brought up in disfunctional family doesnt serve any purpose to a person with emotional damage and no amount of counselling, theraphy, medication will help this person it would help temporarily and then again they head back to same mania and depression