Reductionist Theory Of Psychiatry

In traditional medicine, diagnosis of diseases and disorders made by clinicians are typically based upon the quantifiable differences between ‘zones of rarity’ i.e distinctive boundaries in the underlying pathology of illness and disorder’s which enables clinicians to administer an accurate diagnosis and effective treatments that has a well-established homogeneity and validity amongst clinicians internationally. In an attempt to establish itself within the field of contemporary medicine, psychiatry also attempted to adopt this reductionist approach. In fact, several attempts have been made to identify these distinctive boundaries between psychiatric disorders as well ‘normality’ and mental illness, all of which have ultimately ended as failures
This approach has formed the basis for the current diagnostic manuals which were published in an attempt to unify diagnostic classifications used in routine clinical practice by clinicians and researchers. Currently, the two most wildly used diagnostic manuals are the International Classification of Disease and the 5h edition of the Diagnostical and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders which have been refined over the years to reflect the ongoing changes in our understanding of psychiatric disorders. This essay will aim to discuss this approach to diagnosing psychiatric disorders based on characteristic clusters of symptoms has led to meaningful scientific research into both the aetiology and treatment of psychiatric disorders with an emphasis on both Bipolar Disoder and
For example: the original reductionist and narrow view of the aetiology of schizophrenia in the 1960’s utilized ‘treatments’ such as institutionalisation and sedation together with insulin coma and electroconvulsive therapies. This new approach to diagnosis based on clustering led to the development of antipsychotics (the most well-known being chlorpromazine). Few landmark drugs have so dramatically changed the way that a disease is managed as the first antipsychotic agent chlorpromazine did with schizophrenia because it helped to alleviate the ‘positive symptoms’ schizophrenia without the need for outdated invasive approaches such as straitjackets and other restraints which in turn led to more patients being discharged and returning to their pre-institutionalized life. Following, this development researchers then focused on developing more efficacious pharmaceutical approaches that would help to target not only positive symptoms but also the disorganised and negative symptoms associated with schizophrenia. These advancements led to the subsequent development of Clozapine: a drug which is seen as being clinically superior to traditional antipsychotic due to its ability