Our Most Vital Organ
I spent some time listening to Dr. Daniel Amen speaking this past weekend on Dr. Kenneth Cooper's Healthy Living radio show. Dr. Amen is a psychiatrist, affiliated with the University of California at Irvine. His specialty is brain imaging, in particular, a type of image called a SPECT scan. This scan shows brain activity, rather than picturing the brain itself. Some of the things that Amen said were rather surprising to me, and I thought it would be good to share them with you.
Some of the relatively unsurprising things said were that head trauma and exposure to toxic chemicals can injure your brain. Because of this, he advises against sports like football and boxing and that people who handle solvents only do it in very well ventiliated environments or with good safety gear (or both!). The thing that startled me was his advice against soccer. He points out that our brain has the approximate consistency of custard and that it's housed in a skull that's quite hard. Causing the two to strike each other causes serious damage, but even just shaking the brain can cause damage. His message is "heading the ball injures your brain", and so he recommends against the sport.
One of the other things he points out is that depression is in fact seven or eight distinct disorders. A doctor who prescibes without seeing a brain scan is essentially shooting in the dark, and there's a pretty good chance (about 70%) that the first medication will not work. If you don't seem to get benefit from your depression medication, you should see your doctor about trying a different medication (or arranging a SPECT scan to better diagnose).
He also points out that pshchiatrists and psychologists, whether involved in medical treatment of conditions like depression and attention deficit disorder (ADD) or things like emotional counseling are the only doctors who work without seeing what they are working on.
I think most of us can learn some things by listening to this two-hour radio show. You can find them in mp3 form hosted on the Cooper website here: hour 1 and hour 2. I hope you find it as interesting as I did.
Some of the relatively unsurprising things said were that head trauma and exposure to toxic chemicals can injure your brain. Because of this, he advises against sports like football and boxing and that people who handle solvents only do it in very well ventiliated environments or with good safety gear (or both!). The thing that startled me was his advice against soccer. He points out that our brain has the approximate consistency of custard and that it's housed in a skull that's quite hard. Causing the two to strike each other causes serious damage, but even just shaking the brain can cause damage. His message is "heading the ball injures your brain", and so he recommends against the sport.
One of the other things he points out is that depression is in fact seven or eight distinct disorders. A doctor who prescibes without seeing a brain scan is essentially shooting in the dark, and there's a pretty good chance (about 70%) that the first medication will not work. If you don't seem to get benefit from your depression medication, you should see your doctor about trying a different medication (or arranging a SPECT scan to better diagnose).
He also points out that pshchiatrists and psychologists, whether involved in medical treatment of conditions like depression and attention deficit disorder (ADD) or things like emotional counseling are the only doctors who work without seeing what they are working on.
I think most of us can learn some things by listening to this two-hour radio show. You can find them in mp3 form hosted on the Cooper website here: hour 1 and hour 2. I hope you find it as interesting as I did.
posted by Scooter at 10:37 AM
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