Personalized Biological Testing in Psychiatry: Inevitable Reality or Impossible Dream?
July 19th 2012Our current diagnostic system is based more on subjective clinical judgments and less biological psychiatry. There is not one way to develop symptoms of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder or autistim or OCD.
Confounding Factors in TRD (Part 1): The Role of Subtyping and Bipolarity
July 19th 2012The current system of payment for mental health care in the US can lead, or even incentivize, clinicians to focus on and code for Axis I disorders and their more readily reimbursed psychopharmacological treatment approaches.
Sex Orientation Change Therapy: Back in the Headlines
July 14th 2012A bill banning mental health providers from engaging in sexual orientation change efforts with patients passed the California Senate just weeks after prominent psychiatrist Robert Spitzer, MD, apologized to the gay community for his 2003 study.
Ketamine-Induced Optimism: New Hope for the Development of Rapid-Acting Antidepressants
July 14th 2012There is rapidly escalating interest in drugs that target the glutamatergic neurotransmitter system, especially NMDA receptor modulators. The hope is that they will fill the large unmet need for rapid-acting antidepressant medications with efficacy in treatment-resistant depression.
Treatment of Sudden, Intense Rage Reactivity After Minor Head Injury
July 5th 2012Propranolol therapy at a relatively low dose can cause anger and rage behaviors to subside in some patients. This case describes a man with Down syndrome who, after an accident, sustained minor brain trauma. Subsequently, he regressed to a rage state he had experienced when he was younger.
The Duty to Protect: When Has It Been Discharged?
July 2nd 2012The California Supreme Court’s decision in the Tarasoff case over 30 years ago has become a standard part of mental health practice. This case influenced the legal requirements governing therapists’ duty to protect third parties in nearly every state in the US.
Breaking Up Is Hard to Do: Terminating Therapy Before Things Get Out of Hand
June 30th 2012Cases that come to our attention as malpractice claims, ethics claims, or Board of Registration complaints raise the question: why did the treating clinician not terminate the treatment before things got so out of hand?