their use. (Whitaker 2010, p. 333)
Recent systematic reviews of quality placebo-controlled trials bear out Whitaker’s observations and provide confirmation that available pharmacologic treatments do not adequately address common mental health problems including major depressive disorder (Kirsch 2008; Thase 2008; Fournier, DeRubeis, Hollon, Dimidjian, Amsterdam, Shelton, and Fawcett 2010) bipolar disorder (Fountoulakis 2008), schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders (Dixon, Dickerson, Bellack, Bennett, Dickinson, Goldberg, Lehman, Tenhula, Calmes, Pasillas, Peer, and Kreyenbuhl 2009; Tajima, Fernandez, Lopez-Ibor, Carrasco and Diaz-Marsa 2009), dementia (Birks 2006; Lam, Kennedy, Grigoriadis, McIntyre, Milev, Ramasubbu, Parikh, Patten, and Ravindran 2009), obsessive-compulsive disorder (Schoenfelt and Weston 2007), post-traumatic stress disorder (Berger, Mendlowicz, Marques-Portella, Kinrys, Fontenelle, Marmar and Figueira 2008), and generalized anxiety disorder (Katzman 2009). In spite of compelling evidence to the contrary, we continue to treat symptoms as if they are caused by a ‘broken brain’ in which deficiencies or “imbalances” of serotonin and other neurotransmitters are regarded by modern psychiatry as sufficient explanations of mental illness.
In 2009, one out of eight adults in the USA was taking psychiatric medication, most believing that medications are necessary for bolstering brain function in the way that insulin is essential for the diabetic. The results to society have not been positive. In 2007 the disability rate due to mental illness was 1 in every 76 Americans. That’s more than double the rate in 1987 [a year before Prozac was introduced], and six times the rate in 1955 [before psychotropics were being used] (Whitaker 2010, p. 10). The tremendous increase in the number of people claiming disability for mental illness is an indictment of contemporary biomedical psychiatry and points to serious unresolved problems of efficacy and safety with available psychotropic medications.
In other words, when psychiatric medications are used as the sole sources of healing and do not address the root cause of illness, they may be ineffective or result in worsening, to the point where patients turn to more potent synthetic medications sometimes resulting in debilitating adverse effects that interfere with their ability to function socially and at work. Research on the long-term effects of psychiatric medications reported by the Director of the National Institute of Mental Health in 1996 reveal that they compromise brain function rather than enhance it (Hyman 1996, pp.151-61).
We have hunted for big simple neuro-chemical explanations for psychiatric disorders and have not found them. (Lacasse 2005, pp.1211-1216 in Psychological Medicine, 2005)
Cultures and healing traditions outside our borders that offer effective therapies other than psychotropic drugs can add to our toolbox for improving mental health and promoting wellness. In order to transform mental health care into a more effective, more humane model it is incumbent on physicians to remain rigorously open minded about the range of alternative therapies and integrate those that work and are safe into the current model of biomedical psychiatry. Only in this way can the general population achieve a higher level of wellness.
Techniques for Releasing Trauma
Are there simpler and safer techniques to release the energy trapped in emotional imbalances and dysfunctional patterns related to trauma? If severe mental imbalances originate in trauma, wouldn’t it be more direct to simply resolve those traumas, rather than try to mask the results of trauma that have become the symptoms of mental imbalance?
In the not so distant past, long-term psychotherapy and psychoanalysis attempted to resolve deep-seated trauma through offering individuals a healing relationship with the therapist, entailing months or years of one-hour sessions, often more than once a week. Through the 1980s, some long-term therapy could be billed to insurance, which made it more affordable for the general public, but that has changed. The popular book I Never Promised You a Rose Garden chronicled the healing of a woman diagnosed with schizophrenia who came to be a successful and prolific author. She attributed her healing to her psychotherapist. The filmmaker Daniel Mackler interviewed the author, Joanne Greenberg, on camera, for his documentary Take These Broken Wings. She said her own story was reflected in the book and, “I never would have healed in today’s world if I had been given drugs and not had years of psychotherapy [to heal from the trauma she experienced as a child].”
Today, long-term therapy is categorized as “actualization” and cannot be billed to insurance as it does not relate to a disease category in the DSM. Instead, brief therapy of 2-3 sessions is billable and considered sufficient to deal with emotional illness.
There are excellent therapies for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). These therapies include EMDR, EFT, and WHEE. They are especially effective for eliminating the effects of past traumas, as well as lingering negative emotional states, such as anxiety, depression, fear, frustration, sadness, and anger. They have been effective in treating panic disorder, chronic pain, and addictive cravings. Following is a brief description of these therapies. Please keep in mind we do not feel these replace long-term therapy and a healing relationship with a therapist; we do believe that these therapies can be a helpful component in treating a serious mental imbalance in some cases, and that they may be more ideally suited to those with less serious mental illnesses.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is currently recommended by the American Psychiatric Association as a treatment of choice for PTSD and is considered as effective as cognitive-behavioral therapy. EMDR has an extensive research base to confirm its efficacy in treating PTSD and requires therapists to facilitate it, as it is complex and may catalyze extreme catharsis. It is based on unlocking specific sites where emotional pain is buried. It does not appear to have a “spiritual” basis.
Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT): Psychologist Roger Callahan and Stanford engineer Gary Craig developed EFT. The technique is gentle and quick. In a session, the client is instructed to recollect thoughts, feelings, or images of a painful situation (emotional or physical) of which he or she wants to be free (e.g., an irrational fear) while the practitioner guides him or her to gently tap specific points of the face, neck or chest. The tapping on specific points on meridians of the body neutralizes disruptions in the body’s electrical system, which stops the chemical chain reaction causing the unwanted response pattern and thus frees the client from the associated emotional and physical discomforts. As the client gently taps on a point, the neural receptors under the skin convert the pressure to an electrical impulse that is transmitted to the brain--similar to using a remote control or tapping a key on a keyboard to send an electrical signal to the computer generating the output, balancing the right and left hemispheres of the brain.
WHEE is a wholistic hybrid of EMDR and emotional freedom technique (EFT) created by psychiatrist, Daniel Benor. WHEE can be easily done without a therapist. Benor writes,
It invites the body to participate in releasing anxieties and stresses. It is a way to reduce the intensity of negative feelings and to reprogram negativity in general…You simply alternate tapping on the right and left side of your body while reciting an affirmation, and the negativity melts away. You can then use the same process to install positive feelings, beliefs and awarenesses--to replace the negativity you have released. This is not about doing away with issues so that we can forget, ignore or run away from them, but transforming the energy that has been locked up in trauma” (see http://www.wholistichealingresearch.com).
To repeat, although techniques for releasing trauma are available and psychotherapy is sometimes used, mainstream medicine and managed care focus on the biochemical roots of illness. After all, managed care visits with health professionals have been reduced to 15-20 minutes—time to review medications but not much else.
Spiritual Practices
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