Advocacy for Mental Health Clients

Few psychiatrists advocate for the consumer, but some prominent ones do. An example is Dr. Abram Hoffer.

"Today, most of the mental hospitals have shut down but they have not disappeared. By refusing to accept patients,and by discharging them before they are ready for independent living, they converted the community into the new mental hospitals. About half of the homeless people on our streets are schizophrenics, many of whom have been treated in mental hospitals or psychiatric wards, placed on tranquilizers, and then discharged to fend for themselves." Dr. Abram Hoffer

This quote is from "Hoffer's Home Page", which is his Canadian schizophrenia website. The American psychiatrist Dr. E. Fuller Torrey has expressed similar sentiments. My view is that the state hospitals should have been improved rather than shut down. Now we have halfway houses that aren't wanted by their neighborhood residents.

Websites

There are a number of advocacy websites and Yahoo groups for consumers. An outstanding website is the Transformation Center at www.transformation-center.org. This website contains Voices for Change, which is an advocacy newsletter I write for. Another interesting website is the Boston Resource Center at www.bostonresourcecenter.org.

NAMI

This abberviation is short for the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, which is run largely by parents of the mentally ill. I have a different perspective than this organization. It favors more medical research, which is good, but it seems to be unaware of the horrendous problems with psychiatric drugs. I have tried to make them aware of these problems, but I seem to have largely failed at this. They also seem unaware of orthomolecular psychiatry, which I favor. Again I have tried to make them aware of this. Again I have largely failed.

They do have a consumer affliiate, which is called NAMI GB CAN. The GB tand for Greater Boston. The CAN stands for Consumer Advocacy/Affiliate Network. Their mailing address is as follows:

NAMI GB CAN
c/o Solomon Carter Fuller DMH
Suite G08A
85 East Newton Street
Boston, MA 02118

Thier website is www.namigbcan.org.

One of the things that has never ceased to amaze me about NAMI is that they seem to regard Dr. E. Fuller Torrey as a saint of mental health. However, Torrey has a bizarre theory that schizophrenia is caused by a virus that people get from cat excrement (1,2)! The justification is that neuropathology has been found (3,4). However, neuropathology could also be caused by a toxin as favored by Hoffer. Hoffer blamed schizophrenia on a toxic amine.

An antiviral agent was used to treat schizophrenics (5), but this treatment failed. If schizophrenia was caused by a virus, then schizophrenia could be contagious. There is no evidence that schizophrenia is contagious.

On the positive side, Torrey has advocated for the homeless. If his theory was correct, then all the psychiatric drugs would probably be worthless. None of these drugs were designed to treat a virus.

Conclusions

But what is the real explanation for schizophrenia? What is the explanation for bipolar disorder? These diseases, which I believe are very similar and closely related, are explained in my Associated Content references, which are available free full text.

Ref. 11 lists some toxic effects of some psychiatric drugs on newborns when the Mother has been taking the drug during pregnancy. My articles at Associated Content also list adverse side effects of these drugs. I have not referenced them all because I have published hundreds of articles there. I have published some shorter articles at Gather. Associated Content does not like short articles.

SSRI drugs are used for depression and bipolar disorder (12). But what about nutrition? Ref. 13 supports nutritional theories.

"Decreasing and low levels of serum folate and deficient levels of B12 were associated with greater risk of depressive symptoms in older Chinese adults." Ng TP, Feng L, Niti M, Kua EH, Yap KB.
Gerontological Research Programme, National University of Singapore, Department of Psychological Medicine, National University Hospital, 5 Lower Kent Ridge Road, 119074 Singapore.

The quotation is from Ref. 13.

References

1. Yolken RH, Torrey EF. Viruses, Schizophrenia and Bipolar Disorder. Clin Microb Review 1995; 1: 131-45.

2. Torrey EF. Stalking the schizovirus. Schizophr Bull 1988; 14: 223-29.

3. Bogerts B. The neuropathology of schizophrenic diseases: historical aspects and present knowledge. Eur Arch Psychiatry Clin Neurosci. 1999; 249 Suppl 4:2-13.

4. Harrison PJ : The neuropathology of schizophrenia. A critical review of the data and their interpretation. Brain 1999; 122 :593-624.

5. DELISI, L.E., GOLDIN, L.R., NURNBERGER, J.I., ET AL: Failure to Alleviate Symptoms of Schizophrenia with the Novel Use of an Antiviral Agent, Acyclovir (Zovirax). Biol. Psychiatry, 22(2); 216-20, 1987.

6. www.associatedcontent.com/article/1903696/super_psychiatrists_dr_uranova.html

7. www.associatedcontent.com/article/1900228/the_giants_of_science_psychiatry.html

8. www.associatedcontent.com/article/1885884/top_nutrition_doctors_the_giants_of.html

9. www.associatedcontent.com/article/1878963/integrative_medicine_and_psychiatry.html

10. www.associatedcontent.com/article/1875519/let_them_eat_risperidone.html

11. SSRI antidepressants and persistent pulmonary hypertension in newborns.

[No authors listed]

Prescrire Int. 2008 Aug;17(96):156.

12. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors are associated with a modest increase in the risk of upper gastrointestinal bleeding.

Targownik LE, Bolton JM, Metge CJ, Leung S, Sareen J.

Am J Gastroenterol. 2009 Jun;104(6):1475-82. Epub 2009 Apr 28.

13. Folate, vitamin B12, homocysteine, and depressive symptoms in a population sample of older Chinese adults.

Ng TP, Feng L, Niti M, Kua EH, Yap KB.

J Am Geriatr Soc. 2009 May;57(5):871-6.