Friday, June 14, 2019

Review: OTHOMOLECULAR TREATMENT FOR SCHIZOPHRENIA


Orthomolecular Treatment for Schizophrenia
by Dr. A, Hoffer, M.D., Ph.D.

.....This is a very brief book (50 pages of prose) focused on providing the reader with illustrations and examples of how orthomolecular treatment helped his clients who often suffered horribly from the ravages of schizophrenia.
.....While his selections of case histories is varied and illustrative of the various forms and presentations of Schizophrenia this is not a text useful for formulating a specific treatment.  It is written to help those facing this illness realize that there are other options for those afflicted with Schizophrenia besides a lifetime of reliance on medication aimed at resolving symptoms.  This medication often has permanent side effects that are known and futre side effects that have not been foreseen.
.....The book is well documented with 76 research studies listed and referenced wherever Dr. Hoffer makes a factual assertion.  So while the short text is easy to read, avoids explaining probable mechanisms and bogging the non-technical reader down it also provides links to well done research often in reputable publications.
.....The book was of interest to me because my daughter suffered from horrid, uninformed even if well intended treatment that delayed her care.  Dr. Hoffer writes about the mentally ill due to metabolism dysfunction and nutritional imbalances coming to him from families who had initially gone to professionals using debunked "recovered memory techniques" in the 1980's and 90's when the technique was popular.    Dr. Hoffer understood the importance of intact and caring families to support and help the mentally ill recover.  He commented on this experience: "...I find it very helpful to have the family in my office during the interview, with the patient's permission. A lot of time is saved in gathering the information needed to make the diagnosis.  It also helps when the family hears the discussion and knows what the treatment will be.  Although most psychiatrists no longer blame the family for the illness of a relative, it can still occur.  It is important to remove any guilt them family may have derived from previous outmoded, harmful explanations."
.....I give the book 5 stars because it has a focus on case histories and research substantiated positions that can help anyone who is ravaged by mental illness or has a family ravaged by mental illness.  The book was written over 20 years ago now and much more about the physical pathways to schizophrenia is known now that was not known then but the details of those pathways are not important to the impact of this book. Despite the impediments to the widespread use of orthomolecular techniques during his lifetime Dr. Hoffer saw the change coming and he had great hope:
"..If and when orthomolecular therapy is widely used and is widely accepted, the whole field of the biochemistry of schizophrenia and its treatment will flourish.
...It would be very exciting to come back in the year of 2020 to see what happened to this field."
I do hope he is right!

OTHER REVIEWS
      Some of the reviews of this book address some important issues.   There were 74 reviews on Amazon.com at the time of my reading the text.  The ratio of 5 star ratings to 1 star ratings is very positive (the ration of 70% 5 star vs, 7% 1 star is fairly high for texts of this type).  Below are what I think are the best of the lot

Pellagra and Schizophrenia ARE THE SAME, Nutrient Deficiencies.
September 8, 2013

Psychiatrist Dr Abram Hoffer MD PhD treated and cured patients with Schizophrenia until his death in 2009, for fifty five years with Vitamin B3, otherwise known as Niacin. This publication points out that Pellagra and Schizophrenia are one and the same disease, one being more intense than the other in its requirement of nutrient supplementation.

Anyone who has a psychiatric disorder should be encouraged to look into Vitamin B3 (Niacin) to get off psycho-pharmaceutical drugs that don't offer a cure.

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Mother of a 22 year old son
July 9, 2012

My son was diagnosed with schizophrenia at age 18. He was hospitalized and released. He was taking resperidral and it stopped working. Doctors put him on another med which didn't work. I started doing some Internet research on alternative choices and came across orthomolecular medicine for schizophrenia. We read the books and contacted an orthomolecular psychiatrist in our area and my son started on the supplements right away. He felt better within a day. He returned to his original medication as well and he is feeling better than ever. His personality is back his symptoms are minimal. He's going to school and working. He's more organized. Hes thinking and planning his future. He's laughing and engaged with others. This has been a life changing experience for him and everyone in our family. I urge everyone who has the diagnosis to read the books and contact an orthomolecular doctor.

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Quotes of Interest:

   The quotes below provide the fodder for why so many peers were not supportive of Dr. Hoffer's efforts.   In 1999 when this was written he had been working almost 50 years and he was aware of the immense effectiveness of his approach. He understood how the profit motive supports continued sickness. 

"...Modern Psychiatry seduced by the drug companies and their wares has no use for nutrition nor for nutrients (these are not promoted with huge advertising budgets, commercially motivated conferences, training sessions etc.) When treatment is determined by bottom-line mentality the only profit that flows from the drugs is the long term, unsuccessful treatment of the chronically ill, a monetary profit of benefit to the industry, not the patient.  We can not forget that the business of business is to make money, but the business of medicine is to cure the sick."
                                                                                                                                   pg 12
Citing the study
   Huxley J., Mayr, E., Osmond, H., Hoffer, A. "Schizophrenia as a Genetic Morphism." Nature 204: 220-221, 1964 
Dr, Hoffer states:
"...Schizophrenics themselves tend to be physically superior non schizophrenics^24 and appear more youthful (even in old age); their hair does not turn gray as early as the normal population's would; they have a higher tolerance for pain; they do not have as high an incidence of arthritis or cancer and they are more resistant to bacterial infections.  They also seem to be more creative, a psychological trait due perhaps to their inner experience with perceptual changes...."  

                                                                                                                                   pg 19
  "..I came to believe that cerebral allergy plays a major role in the etiology of the schizophrenic syndrome...But even when there are no allergies I advise the elimination of all junk food, especially those with added sugars...Foods containing added sugars invariably contain other additives."
                                                                                                                                   pg 25
In the late 1900's psychoanalytic approaches to mental health included what came to be known as "Recovered Memory Therapy"  This therapy aimed to revive dormant or "repressed memories" (which have since been debunked by researchers and experts in memory like Dr. Elizabeth Loftus).   Horrid memories thought to be from childhood were very often pseudomemories confabulated from media depictions, horror films or subtly suggested by the therapist seeking to help the client "explain" and "understand" the impaired judgments of often mentally ill patients.  Professionals were trained in and used these "memory recovery techniques".   Many later came to reject the approach as harmful (Dr. Paul Simpson wrote a book, "Second Thoughts" about the experience.)  These "memory recovery" techniques disrupted lives, caused family estrangement and often deepened the mental maladies of clients while also increasing the possibility of  suicide.   Dr. Hoffer likely saw the mentally ill due to metabolism dysfunction and nutritional imbalances coming to him from families who had initially gone to professionals using these now debunked "recovered memory techniques" in the 1980's and 90's when the technique was popular.    Dr. Hoffer understood the importance of intact and caring families to support and help the mentally ill recover.  He commented on this experience:
 "...I find it very helpful to have the family in my office during the interview, with the patient's permission. A lot of time is saved in gathering the information needed to make the diagnosis.  It also helps when the family hears the discussion and knows what the treatment will be.  Although most psychiatrists no longer blame the family for the illness of a relative, it can still occur.  It is important to remove any guilt them family may have derived from previous outmoded, harmful explanations."
                                                                                                                                   pg 40
Dr. Hoffer critiques his own profession:
"...Modern psychiatrists are accustomed to seeing very rapid response to drugs; the do not have the patience to work gradually with their patients over the course of many years.  Modern psychiatric wards are tranquilizer filling stations similar in function to gasoline filling stations.  Patients are admitted for a refill and rapidly discharged, irrespective of the mental condition."  ..."
                                                                                                                                  pg 45
Despite the impediments to the widespread use of orthomolecular techniques during his lifetime Dr. Hoffer saw the change coming and he had great hope:
"..If and when orthomolecular therapy is widely is widely accepted, the whole field of the biochemistry of schizophrenia and its treatment will flourish.
...It would be very exciting to come back in the year of 2020 to see what happened to this field."
I do hope he is right!


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*** WARNING ***
If you are seeking help for personal struggles and a therapist, counselor or friend says that "recovering childhood memories can help you get better" then IMMEDIATELY get up from your chair (or off the couch), run to the door, open it and flee. Hundreds of thousands have lost families, years of productive living and squandered immense wealth with tragedy inducing therapy that produces horrid false memories, splinters families, isolates the client and is documented to cause decline in mental health.

OUR DAUGHTER BEFORE THERAPY

MEMORY EXPERTS COMMENT
DARK AGES OF MENTAL HEALTH TREATMENT

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