Ronald W. Pies, MD

The title of Gardiner Harris’s front-page story in the March 6 New York Times was blunt: “Talk Doesn’t Pay, So Psychiatry Turns Instead to Drug Therapy.” For those of us who see our profession as a humanistic calling, this piece is likely to provoke a mixture of sadness and anger.

Is it possible to “forgive” Jared Lee Loughner for what he is alleged to have done? Is it morally justifiable to do so?

. . . her fixed state is one of intent though fruitless searching. She is inactive not because she is too lazy to work but because work has become meaningless to her; her energy is paralyzed not by sleep but by thought.”

Anyone who has written blogs or published articles online knows that the Internet is the new “Wild West,” so far as etiquette is concerned.

Have you been following the recent dust-up in the anthropology world? It all started, as Nicholas Wade wrote, “…after a decision by the American Anthropological Association at its recent annual meeting to strip the word “science” from a statement of its long-range plan.”

A meta-analysis sheds new light on the safety and efficacy of antidepressants in the acute treatment of bipolar disorder.

I do not believe that a nation as rich as ours (albeit with most wealth concentrated among the upper income levels) can shirk its moral responsibilities in the matter of providing basic health care for all its citizens.

For some patients with MDD, there are indeed “remembered gifts” that are appreciated on recovery from their depression. But this is not to say that MDD itself is “adaptive” during the course of the patient’s illness.

The recent disaster that trapped 33 Chilean miners for the past 2 months piqued my curiosity as a psychiatric researcher: how will these hearty survivors cope with the aftermath of being buried alive?

Clearly, we all share the goals of respecting-not “medicalizing”-ordinary grief; as well as recognizing and treating clinically significant depression. We differ with Dr Frances in how to achieve these goals, while remaining faithful to the best available scientific data.

My colleague Allen Frances is rightly concerned with the risk of over-calling normal grief as major depression - - that is, the risk of "false positives" - - if the DSM-IV "bereavement exclusion" is dropped in the DSM-5 while the 2-week minimum duration criterion is retained.

Psychiatric Times bids a very fond farewell to our long-time board member Jeffrey L. Cummings, MD, who was the originator of the Psychiatric Times “Brain and Behavior” column, which he penned for several years.

Consider the predicament of Mrs M, a 38-year-old premenopausal mother of two. Mrs M tells her primary care physician, “I just don’t have a strong desire for sex. It’s been about 10 years now, and I hardly ever have sexual thoughts or fantasies.

Researchers who have spent their careers studying schizophrenia and mood disorders might be forgiven a bit of “biomarker envy.” At long last, it seems that the neurologists and neuropsychiatrists have developed some fairly sensitive and specific “lab tests” for Alzheimer’s Disease (AD).

Many Americans seem angry at President Obama’s seeming lack of anger over the BP fiasco. Frustration with the environmental calamity in the Gulf is perfectly understandable. Anger with those who should have foreseen and prevented this horrendous situation is also understandable, and-up to a point-quite justifiable.

Consider the predicament of Mrs M-a 38-year old premenopausal mother of two. Mrs M tells her primary care physician, “I just don’t have a strong desire for sex."

Almost the first memory I have of a physician is our family doctor at my bedside, leaning over to press his warm fingers against my neck and beneath my jaw. I’m 5, maybe 6 years old. I have a fever and a sore throat, and Dr Gerace is carefully palpating my cervical and submandibular lymph nodes.

It’s an embarrassment, no doubt about it. For those of you who have been following the intense debate over the DSM-5, it’s high time to ask: how much longer will the public put up with a medical specialty like this?

The recently posted draft of DSM5 makes a seemingly small suggestion that would profoundly affect how grief is handled by psychiatry.

Oregon’s Governor Kulongoski has vetoed a bill that would have allowed psychologists to practice clinical medicine without adequate training-otherwise known by the euphemism of “prescribing.” The Governor’s rationale was precisely the one opponents of the bill, such as I, had advocated.

Readers who know me well will not be surprised by my citing the Tao Te Ching-but some may be taken aback by my quoting football legend, Kurt Warner, who announced his retirement recently.1 Mr Warner had some wise things to say about leaving a job under your own steam, while you are still in good health-and preferably, before you are shown the door. As I prepare to step down from the editor in chief position at Psychiatric Times in June, I believe I can honestly claim that these conditions apply to my departure. The “hail and farewell!” is intended to encompass both my leave-taking from the helm and my greetings to the incoming editor in chief-my friend and colleague, James Knoll, MD.

In 5 minutes, so much can be accomplished.

Almost the first memory I have of a physician is our family doctor at my bedside, leaning over to press his warm fingers against my neck and beneath my jaw. I’m 5, maybe 6 years old. I have a fever and a sore throat, and Dr Gerace is carefully palpating my cervical and submandibular lymph nodes. In my family, Dr Gerace’s opinion carried a lot of weight. It was the 1950s, and my mother did not quite trust those new-fangled antibiotics. She usually tried to haggle with the doctor over the dose-“Can’t the boy take just half that much?”-but even my mother would ultimately bow to Dr Gerace’s considered opinion.

Oregon’s Governor Kulongoski has vetoed a bill that would have allowed psychologists to practice clinical medicine without adequate training-otherwise known by the euphemism of "prescribing." The Governor's rationale was precisely the one opponents of the bill, such as myself, had advocated.

It is safe to say that few authors of mental health–related books would introduce themselves by presenting these credentials:

Writer Jonah Lehrer caused quite a stir with his recent article in the New York Times Magazine, with the unfortunate title, “Depression’s Upside.” I have a detailed rejoinder to this misleading article posted on the Psychcentral website.

The issues being debated here have important long-term implications for psychiatry, and we are pleased to present these revised versions of 2 principal presentations.

Arlington, VA, March 2 (compiled from AP reports)-Officials at the American Psychiatric Association (APA) confirmed today that their national headquarters had been taken over by “very, very large English and literature teachers,” according to a spokesperson for APA President, Dr Alan Schatzberg. Schatzberg himself was unavailable for comment and was reported to be in seclusion “…brushing up his Shakespeare.”

Quick-which screening test or instrument has greater specificity for the target condition: the PSA (prostate specific antigen) test for prostate cancer, or the BSDS (Bipolar Spectrum Diagnostic Scale), for bipolar disorders?

Another lifetime ago-just after leaving residency-I took a job as a psychiatric consultant at a large, university mental health center. Had I known the poisoned politics of the place, I would have headed for someplace safe-like, say, Afghanistan.