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MONTREAL – Psychiatrists can further the quest toward more evidence-based medicine by treating the neurophysiologic origins of behavioral disorders, David Cantor, Ph.D., said at the annual conference of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society.
With the use of quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG) to identify specific abnormalities in brain function, psychiatric therapy can be individualized to address subtleties that may not correlate well with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, said Dr. Cantor of Duluth, Ga., who is president of the society.
“Many roads lead to Rome, and there are many different types of abnormal brain physiology that can result in what we call attention-deficit disorder, depression, or any of the other psychiatric disorders,” he said in an interview.
“We need evidence of abnormal brain function in order to show there's a physiologic need for a drug or therapy, and then we need information about the specific nature of the abnormality to help us select” a drug or therapy, Dr. Cantor said.
Using attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as an example, he said that most current diagnostic and pharmacotherapeutic approaches fail to distinguish between subtle variations.
“Whether a patient has ADD or strictly a hyperactive impulsive problem, or whether they have a combination of both, all of these subtypes get prescribed Ritalin at first pass. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize there's something very wrong there. There are subtle differences between these types of people, and there is a different set of abnormal brain physiology features that's contributing to slightly different aspects of their functioning,” he said.
Dr. Cantor said that a growing cross section of psychiatry, psychology, neurology, and other mental health clinicians is placing much more emphasis on the concept of “brain screening” with QEEG to aid diagnosis and therapy decisions. The paradigm shift, however, seems to be occurring faster in countries outside of North America.
“At least in this country, psychiatrists seem largely to have not gotten the word. They're still relying on just tying symptoms to drugs and calling it a day. But there are thousands of clinicians worldwide who are using this already and have been using it for a number of years. A whole commercial industry is being launched that says if you want to be precise about what you're prescribing, you may need to look at the brain first,” he said.
Dr. Cantor disclosed his partnership with BrainDx LLC, which provides QEEG analytic services for health practitioners worldwide. The company is not yet actively selling or distributing its software.
MONTREAL – Psychiatrists can further the quest toward more evidence-based medicine by treating the neurophysiologic origins of behavioral disorders, David Cantor, Ph.D., said at the annual conference of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society.
With the use of quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG) to identify specific abnormalities in brain function, psychiatric therapy can be individualized to address subtleties that may not correlate well with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, said Dr. Cantor of Duluth, Ga., who is president of the society.
“Many roads lead to Rome, and there are many different types of abnormal brain physiology that can result in what we call attention-deficit disorder, depression, or any of the other psychiatric disorders,” he said in an interview.
“We need evidence of abnormal brain function in order to show there's a physiologic need for a drug or therapy, and then we need information about the specific nature of the abnormality to help us select” a drug or therapy, Dr. Cantor said.
Using attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as an example, he said that most current diagnostic and pharmacotherapeutic approaches fail to distinguish between subtle variations.
“Whether a patient has ADD or strictly a hyperactive impulsive problem, or whether they have a combination of both, all of these subtypes get prescribed Ritalin at first pass. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize there's something very wrong there. There are subtle differences between these types of people, and there is a different set of abnormal brain physiology features that's contributing to slightly different aspects of their functioning,” he said.
Dr. Cantor said that a growing cross section of psychiatry, psychology, neurology, and other mental health clinicians is placing much more emphasis on the concept of “brain screening” with QEEG to aid diagnosis and therapy decisions. The paradigm shift, however, seems to be occurring faster in countries outside of North America.
“At least in this country, psychiatrists seem largely to have not gotten the word. They're still relying on just tying symptoms to drugs and calling it a day. But there are thousands of clinicians worldwide who are using this already and have been using it for a number of years. A whole commercial industry is being launched that says if you want to be precise about what you're prescribing, you may need to look at the brain first,” he said.
Dr. Cantor disclosed his partnership with BrainDx LLC, which provides QEEG analytic services for health practitioners worldwide. The company is not yet actively selling or distributing its software.
MONTREAL – Psychiatrists can further the quest toward more evidence-based medicine by treating the neurophysiologic origins of behavioral disorders, David Cantor, Ph.D., said at the annual conference of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society.
With the use of quantitative electroencephalography (QEEG) to identify specific abnormalities in brain function, psychiatric therapy can be individualized to address subtleties that may not correlate well with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, said Dr. Cantor of Duluth, Ga., who is president of the society.
“Many roads lead to Rome, and there are many different types of abnormal brain physiology that can result in what we call attention-deficit disorder, depression, or any of the other psychiatric disorders,” he said in an interview.
“We need evidence of abnormal brain function in order to show there's a physiologic need for a drug or therapy, and then we need information about the specific nature of the abnormality to help us select” a drug or therapy, Dr. Cantor said.
Using attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as an example, he said that most current diagnostic and pharmacotherapeutic approaches fail to distinguish between subtle variations.
“Whether a patient has ADD or strictly a hyperactive impulsive problem, or whether they have a combination of both, all of these subtypes get prescribed Ritalin at first pass. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize there's something very wrong there. There are subtle differences between these types of people, and there is a different set of abnormal brain physiology features that's contributing to slightly different aspects of their functioning,” he said.
Dr. Cantor said that a growing cross section of psychiatry, psychology, neurology, and other mental health clinicians is placing much more emphasis on the concept of “brain screening” with QEEG to aid diagnosis and therapy decisions. The paradigm shift, however, seems to be occurring faster in countries outside of North America.
“At least in this country, psychiatrists seem largely to have not gotten the word. They're still relying on just tying symptoms to drugs and calling it a day. But there are thousands of clinicians worldwide who are using this already and have been using it for a number of years. A whole commercial industry is being launched that says if you want to be precise about what you're prescribing, you may need to look at the brain first,” he said.
Dr. Cantor disclosed his partnership with BrainDx LLC, which provides QEEG analytic services for health practitioners worldwide. The company is not yet actively selling or distributing its software.