"Suzanne O'Sullivan's It's All in Your Head wins Wellcome Book Prize 2016"

[ronddejambe]

Two interesting responses, thank you.

 

[ronddejambe]

The blog you linked to Jaime is fantastic, incidentally. Absolutely shows you how ridiculous the concept is.

 

[Snowdrop]

I think that the concept of psychosomatic illness is probably the result of misinterpretations, bad science, and in some cases outright fraud. It's a simple and wrong answer to a variety of complex problems.

I think of the concept of psychosomatic illness as more an emotional construct than an intellectual one. It's a belief system that can remain unchallenged by lack of evidence or even evidence to the contrary.

 

[TiredSam]

This is the line that i have trouble with.

Is this said on the assumption there is nothing wrong with the patient ?
But clearly there must be something wrong with the patient otherwise they wouldn't be in that position, unless they were faking it. If they were faking it then a listening ear probably won't have any effect.
And what is appropriate therapy in this case ?

Disclaimer : I don't know anything about psycho-somatic illnesses

PS Welcome!

If the patient doesn't improve despite the therapist's best efforts, they are obviously suffering from another condition, for example Pervasive Refusal Syndrome, for which the appropriate therapy is locking them up and bullying them. The patient still won't improve, and will probably deteriorate further, but at least the therapist will feel better.

 

[user9876]

The blog you linked to Jaime is fantastic, incidentally. Absolutely shows you how ridiculous the concept is.

There is a good review of a lot of the evidence for psychosomatic illness discussed on this thread :
http://forums.phoenixrising.me/inde...l-illness-time-to-examine-the-evidence.41553/

 

[JaimeS]

I'm sure it's not the SAME 'Rachel'...

 

[Kati]

Here is a comment by Carolyn Wilshire on James Coyne's blog:
https://jcoynester.wordpress.com/20...imaginary-illness-in-the-lancet/#comment-2110

in response to James C Coyne:
Google Suzanne O’Sullivan and you will find lots of coverage of her book that won the Wellcome Book Prize, but you will not find peer-reviewed articles that she authored. The same thing will happen if you Google Scholar her, where you just get lots of articles that were not written by her. As a neurologist […]



Thank you for the blog, James. I am glad to see others, such as Ronald Pies, taking a stand against the poor reasoning that leads to “psychogenic” explanations of serious illness. It seems so many researchers and clinicians either uncritically accept this narrative, or else consider it somehow unworthy of their critical analysis.

Tony Ward and I recently conducted a comprehensive evaluation the evidence supporting “psychogenic” explanations of illness in the neurological domain. We found that most evidence claimed in support is flawed, and that which is solid provides little support for the claim (currently in press, Perspectives on Psychological Science):

https://www.researchgate.net/public...physical_illness_Time_to_examine_the_evidence

This issue is about more than some harmless “loose thinking”. Receiving a “psychogenic” diagnosis can harm patients in so many ways. The psycholological harms are often underestimated: patients are taught that they have “incorrect beliefs” about their illness, and that f they fail to recover, it is due to their lack of “acceptance” of the psychogenic explanation. Even well meaning doctors will tend to minimise the severity of their condition (indeed, O’Sullivan incorrectly states that many of these illnesses resolve on their own, which is not the case. Many are lifelong and intractable). But the harms go way beyond the psychological. These explanations provide us with a false reassurance that we have the “answer’ to these illnesses, thereby preventing research into their real causes. They can also impact on future care and treatment options: an initial “psychogenic” misdiagnosis can delay diagnosis of a rare disease by up to five years (when compared with other types of misdiagnosis).

This is an issue of enormous importance in contemporary Medicine and Psychology, and it desperately needs our attention

 

[alex3619]

It's a belief system that can remain unchallenged by lack of evidence or even evidence to the contrary.

This is why Sir Karl Popper coined the term nonscience (non-science), specifically for Freudian psychoanalysis. Later the term pseudoscience came into use, I am not sure when.

 

[BurnA]

This is why Sir Karl Popper coined the term nonscience (non-science), specifically for Freudian psychanalsysis. Later the term pseudoscience came into use, I am not sure when.

I created a new thread here about Rethinking Psychology, a new book by Prof Brain Hughes. Seems to be that some psychologists understand the scientific issues behind trials. Its not directly related to Suzanne O Sullivan or this thread but i figured it might be of interest to those who have read this thread.