
Treating depression is guesswork. Psychiatrists are beginning to crack the code - fraqed
http://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/4/4/15073652/precision-psychiatry-depression
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pasbesoin
I recently had an hour or so's conversation with a younger but seasoned
neuropsychologist who is strongly invested in making logical diagnoses.

It was the first time I actually heard someone in his professional area tie
testing results to functional areas of the brain _and their inter-dependent
interaction._

I'm sure what we discussed will be refined, re-evaluated, and in some cases
corrected. But it _made sense._ From verbal profile and testing down to
functional analysis including the insights being gained from successive
generations of ever-more-revealing scanning and physical measurement.

Up until now, I've been inclined to call psychiatrists "witch doctors". (And
psychotherapists, "rent-a-friends.") Maybe that's beginning to change.

With some people. I still expect the majority are locked into institutional
perspectives and career tracks. Despite its call-out to science, the practice
of medicine is actually a very conservative -- to the point of not
infrequently being counter-productive -- activity. At least, in the U.S.

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YCode
> The two main treatments are cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), a talk-
> centered approach that gets patients to readjust their habits, and
> antidepressant medications. Both are about equally effective.

I was under the impression that CBT is actually more effective than
medicating, and especially has far less relapses than medication.

