Reading this article brought back many memories and disillusionment with
clinical trials. However, I believe there are opportunities to
study what a placebo is, and how this condition influences our dependent
measures.
The only psychotropic medications that work are those that sedate
patients who are anxious, manic, or actively psychotic. They
actually help people because they chemically suppress the worst
symptoms. They don't cure people and they are associated with
so many adverse side effects that no one can take them day in and day
out without becoming a zombie.
The other medications, including all the antidepressants, have no
treatment effect. The effects represents the manipulation of the
patients to endorse positive changes on the dependents measures. As a
result of the expectation biases I described before, the
patients endorse change on the measures but their mood stays the same.
Anyone who describes placebo as a treatment effect is
just trying to extract something positive from ingesting these chemicals
when there is nothing there.
The positive change endorsed by the subjects is not a positive change.
The validity of the depression measures have been
compromised by the expectation bias. The Beck Depression Scale is now a
measure of expectation bias and
not a measure of mood.
ECT is pure behavior therapy: "Mr. Smith, we understand that you are
unhappy. We will continue to induce seizures until you feel better."
After a few seizures, Mr. Smith endorses positive change on the Beck
Depression Inventory. The psychiatrist stops inducing seizures.
ECT is a punishment condition.
Just to belabor the point: There are no double blinded studies of
psychotropic meds and any psychotherapy interventions. Given
this situation, we are currently ruminating about the significance of
noise.
Mike Williams
Are Psychiatric Medications Making Us Sicker?
By John Horgan
Several generations of psychotropic drugs have proven to be of little or no
benefit, and may be doing considerable harm.
http://chronicle.com/article/Are-Psychiatric-Medications/128976/
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