Arrowman

Just to be clear, please don't include me in that and that's not the point I was trying to make. I don't think this is about "mainstream doctors pushing drugs" at all. To be clearer: with admittedly limited information, based on freemonkey's OP, my take on this is:

Doctor with mainstream medical background conducts study and invents/names "syndrome" to describe the bleeding obvious (poor diet and inadequate exercise will make you tired and depressed). Result (objective) is media appearances and possibly book/video sales. (Can you spell "Sandra Cabot"?)

Said doctor then embellishes the story in two ways:

1. Implies that inappropriate treatment fro this "syndrome" from "conventional medicine" is commonplace (in this case, "often treated with drugs"); this plays on public distrust of the medical profession;
- imho a doctor who treated a patient with symptoms such as those described, and diagnosed anything other than a diet and exercise deficiency, would be (a) rare and (b) incompetent. That does not imply that all or even most "mainstream" doctors would do that.

2. Concocts a treatment which sounds innovative (a specific course of vitamins and other supplements) and (stunningly) in prescribing vitamins fails to mention the most obvious, natural and cheapest source of such vitamins - a balanced diet.
- for to prescribe "balanced diet" instead of "Vitamins A, B, E+ and micro-particle flugelhyde" makes the doctor sound much more knowledgeable and innovative, and less like they're just stating the bleeding obvious.

imho this is more dangerous than pure quackery because it rides on the credibility of the proponent's medical credentials.

Of course I could be wrong, and I'm prepared to eat my words with more information - but the radio piece that freemonkey described just reeks of this sort of "pop medicine".

Hey, PS: Wasn't it Selenium which killed the aliens in Evolution?

PS2: Kally: Right on, sistah!

Dr Rick

It appears buddhagrrl and freemonkey have uncovered our sinister plot to do something not nice to women for reasons that remain unexplained and cannot benefit us more than any waste-management engineer or grocery clerk holding pharmaceutical stock but that we do anyways just because we are mean and like to hurt people.

[ June 25, 2002: Message edited by: rbochnermd ]</p>

scigirl

I think you are reading wayyy too much into the above posts. Arrowman above doubts that one doctor, not all mainstream doctors.

Hmm, I'll have to check it out. I've read a similar book entitled "Women and Doctors," and I was less than impressed with their so-called "data." But. . . I'd be willing to read more, I guess.

Oh, so he advocates natural stuff, so clearly, he has absolutely nothing to gain from the sale of these supplements (check out how much money homeopathic and alternative medicines are making).

So, how is this different from the original remedy posted by freemonkey?


I'm glad you found a method that worked for you.

I do think that "modern medicine" (whatever that means) does somewhat of a disservice to our entire health since it has become so specialized and reductionistic in some ways. However, I fear that people who abandon hope of traditional medicine in favor of non-scientifically proven remedies such as homeopathy (check out the other thread in this forum about that quackery), are going to regret it.

scigirl (a future "concoctor of ailments for women" aka MD)

liquid

As stated above, it's just a matter of balanced diet and adequate physical stimulation. No real quantifiable 'syndrome' at all.

For a little more practical advice, try brasil nuts and, I think, bananas for that selenium. Cut down on fat, get some exercise, and it really will improve your mood. Especially if you think it will.

Viti

Concocting ailments like PMS? Are you saying PMS does not exist? If so I beg to differ.

buddhagrrl

The symptoms exist, but the medical establishment named it a "syndrome" (i.e., a medical malady) in the '80s. Of course now there's <a href="http://www.pmdd.com/" target="_blank">PMDD</a>, for which there are antidepressant-type drugs you can take, treating it as a psychiatric disorder.

Not saying that these things don't exist, only that they're pathologized in our culture. See Nancy Bonvillan's "Women and Men: Cultural Constructs of Gender" for more.

Viti

Ah I see, I just recently heard of antidepressents that are targeted for PMS that must be the PMDD.

The way I understand it, in medicine a specific set of symptoms is called a syndrome. Like polycystic ovarian syndrome has a list of symptoms, if you have 3 or more of the symptoms you have the syndrome, if you only have one or two you have a slight hormone imbalance. So couldn't PMS simply be a name to encompass a set of symptoms?

buddhagrrl

Right. "A group of signs and symptoms that occur together and characterize a particular abnormality." (Merriam-Webster) How is PMS an "abnormality"? Most women in most cultures cop to some premenstrual discomfort (the degrees to which vary depending on diet and activity levels -- in our Fast Food Nation, we likely suffer more than women whose diets are low in fat and sodium and high in fruits and veggies and grains). In Western (primarily North American) culture, it's something to be treated medically (like childbirth), as well as to be hidden (remember those tampon ads claiming that their product was so compact "no one will know you're on your period"?).

(I'm sorry, I know I'm really banging the drum here. Today's been a reading day for my thesis research and I'm pretty fired up/pissed off, ready to set my bras alight. I'm going for a walk.)

[ June 25, 2002: Message edited by: buddhagrrl ]</p>

liquid

Additionally, symptoms alone are not enough in diagnosing a syndrome. After all, the cause must be there in the first place. For instance, depression can be caused by all sorts of things, and the symptoms listed for 'body blues' happen for all sorts of reasons besides lacking serotonin

Dr Rick

Most men in Western world countries "cop" to some atherosclerosis, but we still consider it an "abnormality."