An examination ofpsychiatry's Diagnostic Manual, its so-called "billing bible,"questions its validity as a medical document and as a basis for diagnosis,treatment and billing.
I have mentioned in previous articles psychiatry's Diagnostic Manualand its inherent problems as a diagnostic and billing tool.
Its full title is: "The American Psychiatric Association's Diagnosticand Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)."
This is a very impressive and scientific title for what has been referred toas psychiatry's "billing bible" of mental disorders.
If a psychiatrist labels someone with one or more of the disorders listed inthe manual, the label will stick and provide all the evidence needed forpsychiatry to begin treatment for the "disorder" and bill theperson's insurance company, government or whoever foots the bill.
It is natural enough for the layman to assume a "disorder" existsbecause it is described in a medical-sounding book. It is natural enough forhim to assume too that scientific research and careful tests lie behind itsentry into such an impressive manual. Thus, when a patient undergoes many yearsof medication, or surgery to his brain it is assumed that the government or theinsurance company is paying for something vitally needed to correct a realcondition.
However, close inspection of the DSM, its content and how that content isarrived at throws its bona fides into serious doubt and insurance companies andheath officials are now beginning to heed human rights groups such as theCitizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) who have worked for many years toraise the alarm over what they contend is a fraudulent manual withoutscientific merit.
You can of course make up your own mind about the DSM. Have a look at itwhen you have a moment. It makes a fascinating read.
The first thing you will notice is that almost every nuance of humanbehavior is included in its list of "disorders" requiring treatment.Virtually any frame of mind south of godlike serenity is, according topsychiatry, a mental illness, which means almost all of us, per the manual, arementally ill. Therefore almost all of us are candidates for a psychiatric labeland expensive drugging or brain surgery, for which our medical insurance orgovernment will foot the bill.
This incidentally apparently lies behind psychiatric claims for more fundingdue to "mental illness being on the rise." What is actually on therise is the number of aspects of human existence RE-CATEGORIZED as "mentalillness." Man in other words - his defamers to the contrary - is not goingmad: he is simply being TOLD he is. And one sure-fire way of driving someone abit loopy is to keep telling him he is mentally ill!
For example, shyness - a common life situation - is now categorized as"Social Anxiety Disorder" (SAD). The shy person, already sufferingfrom shaky self-confidence will no doubt be bolstered to discover that not onlyis he bashful but he has a diseased brain to boot.
The psychiatric drugging industry is already a money-spinning monster but nomatter how huge it grows, the compilers of the DSM are hard at work inventingnew disorders to add to their manual and thus make the net even larger.
Factually, the way a "Disorder" gets listed in the DSM is bymajority vote at a psychiatric conference. A disorder becomes a disorder quiteliterally by a show of hands. Everybody assumes it gets there by way ofelaborate testing, clinical trials and the compiling of results and so forth.No it doesn't. What happens is that someone proposes, say, shyness and theothers vote on it. if a majority vote is achieved, shyness becomes a mentalillness listed in the manual.
The DSM has taken countless aspects of human behavior and reclassified themas a mental illness simply by adding the term "disorder" onto them.That is the sum total of science that goes into the manual! This may sound toooutrageous to be believed, especially as human lives and happiness are atstake, but I invite you to research this for yourself and verify whether what Ihave said here about the DSM is true.
Even key contributors to the DSM admit that there is no scientific ormedical validity to the disorders, yet the DSM nevertheless serves as adiagnostic tool, not only for individual treatment, but in child custodydisputes, court testimony, and so forth.
Imagine if you went to your doctor suffering from an itchy nose and thedoctor took one look at you and made up a diagnosis off the top of his head:"Proboscis Disorder. Very serious. Here, take this drug. Don't be alarmedby the side effects. That will be $500 please!"
Not very scientific is it? Well that is about the same order of scienceemployed by psychiatry, except their "Proboscis Disorder" appears inan impressive-looking book.
Hard to grasp? Let me repeat how it works: observe some aspect of humanbehavior; call it a "disorder" quite arbitrarily and off the top ofyour head, no tests or experimentation involved; put it in a book; label somepeople as suffering from the disorder; start administering drugs, electro-shockor whatever; hope no-one notices the absence of science; bill their insurancecompanies or government; and....well, that's it!
Here by way of illustration is a fictitious example: Joe is lethargic due tobad diet. Observe sluggishness in Joe and similar behaviour in a few otherpeople, although reasons for lethargy might vary (bad diet, hangover, virusetc). Don't investigate to discover why Joe and others are lethargic or evenwhether each lethargy case springs from the same cause. Merely invent a namefor the symptoms that does not explain or establish understanding: "SlothDisorder." Enter "Sloth Disorder" in DSM with a description ofsymptoms, ("sloth...etc.") Diagnose a few people as having SlothDisorder. Write out prescription for drugs. Bill insurance company. Due todrugs person becomes agitated. Invent "Agitation Disorder". Diagnose.Drug. Bill.
