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Biomedical Therapy

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Title: Biomedical Therapy


1
Biomedical Therapy
  • (Module 42)

2
What is it?
  • Biomedical therapy is a way of treating
    psychological disorders by altering the chemical
    balance in the brain.

3
How is it done?
  • Typically drugs are prescribed by psychiatrists,
    the brain circuits are overloaded with
    electroconvulsive shock, or they are disconnected
    through psychosurgery.

4
Background
  • Biomedical therapy in the form of medication or
    drugs was first introduced in the 1950s. It
    reduced over hundreds of thousands of people in
    need of psychosurgery and/or released those who
    had been in hospital confinement. Earlier
    practices consisted of ECT and psychosurgery.

5
Antipsychotic Drugs
  • The revolution of drug therapy began on
    accident when certain drugs helped to calm
    psychotic patients with schizophrenia.
  • Antipsychotic drugs, such as Thorazine, weaken
    responsiveness to irrelevant stimuli. This helps
    rid any auditory paranoia or hallucinations. It
    works in a similar way as the neurotransmitter
    dopamine by occupying receptor sites and blocks
    most activity.

6
Antianxiety Drugs
  • Some examples of antianxiety drugs are Xanax and
    Valium. These work similar to alcohol by
    depressing the central nervous systems activity.
    Usually if someone is taking any antianxiety
    drugs they are taken with other therapy that
    helps them learn how to cope with fear-triggering
    stimuli. The main problem with these drugs is
    that after people stop taking them if they were
    heavily dependent on them they usually experience
    worse anxiety and insomnia.

7
Antidepressant Drugs
  • The most commonly used antidepressant is Prozac.
    They do the opposite as the antianxiety drugs do.
    Instead of calming people down, they lift peoples
    moods up. Most of these pills increase the
    amounts of the neurotransmitters norepinephrine
    and serotonin which are both known to raise
    arousal levels by slowing the process of reuptake.

8
Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT)
  • One of the most controversial procedures done on
    the brain is electroconvulsive therapy. It was
    first used back in 1938 and was practiced on a
    wide awake person who was strapped to a table.
    They would then shock the person with 100 volts
    of electricity to the brain. Now, it is only done
    on people who suffer from severe depression and
    is more humane. The person is under anesthetics
    and wakes up not remembering a thing. It takes
    three sessions of this within two-four weeks
    apart. One major side effect that they have
    minimized over time is memory loss.

9
Psychosurgery
  • The riskiest form of biomedical therapy is
    psychotherapy because the effects are
    irreversible and usually created other behavioral
    problems. This surgery consists of either
    destroying or removal of the brain tissue. The
    best known operation is the lobotomy.

10
History and Death of the Lobotomy
  • 1930s The lobotomy was created by Egas Moniz.
    The process consisted of shocking the patient
    into a coma and then a neurosurgeon would hammer
    an icepicklike instrument through each eye
    socket so it would hit the brain and wiggle it
    around. This would sever connections throughout
    the brain. The process took less than ten
    minutes.
  • 1940s and early 1950s By these decades over
    35,000 people who had been considered severely
    disturbed had received the cruel lobotomy and
    Moniz had been honored with a Nobel prize for his
    discovery.
  • Late 1950s Calming drugs such as the earlier
    mentioned ones had been discovered and ceased the
    need for lobotomies and other forms of
    psychosurgery.
  • Today Psychosurgery is rarely- if ever -used
    today due to all of the new forms of helping
    people suffering from a psychological disorder.

11
The importance behind all of the biomedical
therapies is that everything psychological and
biological can be related.
12
Important Terms to Know
  • Psychopharmacology the study of the effects of
    drugs on mind and behavior
  • Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) operation where
    electric currents are sent through the brain of
    an anesthetized patient who suffers from severe
    depression
  • Psychosurgery a surgery that removes or destroys
    brain tissue in order to change behavior
  • Lobotomy a procedure where the nerves inside the
    brain were disconnected in the frontal lobe by
    inserting an instrument through the eye and
    twisting it inside the brain the goal was to
    destroy the emotion-controlling area

13
Important Drug Names to Know
  • Antipsychotic Thorazine, Clorazil
  • Antianxiety Xanax, Valium,
  • Antidepressant Prozac, Lithium, Zoloft, Paxil
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