Shock Therapy? You Must Be Kidding.

And what about ECT, Electro-convulsive Shock Therapy. We admit, that last entry under self-regulation techniques was just put there for its shock value! But consider the following: After electroshock, the body functions differently, and it does so without any additional medication support. ECT is known to be the most effective treatment for major depression, bar none. And it does not depend on medications. This means that in one fashion or another, the brain/body has been provoked to function in a better way. This means, first of all, that the body-mind had the intrinsic capacity to function well, and that functionality did not require medication. So much for the neurotransmitter deficit model of depression.

And now the question arises, is it in fact necessary to shock the brain into a more functional state? No. We now have both Neurofeedback and rTMS to move the brain gently toward more functional states. So we are not really recommending ECT in the above. We are just pointing out that the best tool in the Medicine chest for depression in fact supports the Self-Regulation Approach to mental illness.

The existing Medical Model costs the nation some 1.5 Trillion Dollars per year, about 15% of our economy. This would be fine if it in fact purchased us health, but our nation ranks tenth at best in terms of health status, whereas our costs are as much as twice what it costs in comparative societies. This is not because we abuse alcohol more, or smoke more, or have more dietary indiscretions, or exercise less. None of these hold true. Rather, we suspect that our system of health care is programming us for progressive dysfunction while it is trying to help us.

The next revolution in Medicine must take into account how our body-mind is organized to function, and to work in concert with that rather than against it. That is the Self-Regulation Remedy. This remedy is already available outside of the Medical Mainstream today. It will ultimately also have to revolutionize Medicine itself.

Nothing illustrates the power of our message better than recovery from coma. Newspapers occasionally report miraculous spontaneous recoveries from coma. Most recently, a young man recovered function some eighteen years after slipping into coma. He thought Reagan was still president. This case, along with many others, makes clear that the brain retained its capacity to function throughout those eighteen years. Did we have to wait for the recovery from coma to occur spontaneously? No! One can appeal to the brain mechanisms at work even in the brain whose consciousness is impaired, and one can gently move the brain toward the recovery of consciousness. This has been systematically done over the last two decades, and the field of Medicine has not paid attention. Why not?
Because this involved non-medical techniques,
and so each individual event of induced recovery was simply dismissed as another instance of spontaneous recovery. In this manner, the mind protects and shields its existing beliefs from inconvenient new facts.

Finally, what makes the impending Revolution of Self-Regulation problematic is that it moves the locus of control from the medical practitioner to the individual seeking service. This revolution cannot happen without empowerment of the individual with respect to medical matters. The Internet is midwife to this process, as information is increasingly being shared, and as non-medical people are becoming knowledgeable about their own condition. As the baby-boomers approach the period of decline of function, and the looming infirmity of old age, they will demand a role in their own care. What is difficult for anyone to see at this point is just how far this process can take us to achieve not only more control over our own health issues, but to fundamentally more healthy and productive lives in the bargain.

For more information on Neurofeedback, visit www.eeginfo.com