Biological Psychiatry - Scope and Detailed Definition

Scope and Detailed Definition

See also: Biological psychology

Biological psychiatry is a branch of psychiatry where the focus is chiefly on researching and understanding the biological basis of major mental disorders such as unipolar and bipolar affective (mood) disorders, schizophrenia and organic mental disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. This knowledge has been gained using imaging techniques, psychopharmacology, neuroimmunochemistry and so on. Discovering the detailed interplay between neurotransmitters and the understanding of the neurotransmitter fingerprint of psychiatric drugs such as clozapine has been a helpful result of the research.

On a research level, it includes all possible biological bases of behavior — biochemical, genetic, physiological, neurological and anatomical. On a clinical level, it includes various therapies, such as drugs, diet, avoidance of environmental contaminants, exercise, and alleviation of the adverse effects of life stress, all of which can cause measurable biochemical changes. The biological psychiatrist views all of these as possible etiologies of or remedies for mental health disorders.

However, the biological psychiatrist typically does not discount psychoanalytic approaches (talk therapies). Medical psychiatric training generally includes both psychodynamic and biological approaches. Accordingly, psychiatrists are usually comfortable with a dual approach: "psychotherapeutic methods are as indispensable as psychopharmacotherapy in a modern psychiatric clinic".

Read more about this topic:  Biological Psychiatry

Famous quotes containing the words scope and, scope, detailed and/or definition:

    A country survives its legislation. That truth should not comfort the conservative nor depress the radical. For it means that public policy can enlarge its scope and increase its audacity, can try big experiments without trembling too much over the result. This nation could enter upon the most radical experiments and could afford to fail in them.
    Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)

    Each man must have his “I;” it is more necessary to him than bread; and if he does not find scope for it within the existing institutions he will be likely to make trouble.
    Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929)

    ... every event has had its cause, and nothing, not the least wind that blows, is accident or causeless. To understand what happens now one must find the cause, which may be very long ago in its beginning, but is surely there, and therefore a knowledge of history as detailed as possible is essential if we are to comprehend the past and be prepared for the future.
    Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973)

    Scientific method is the way to truth, but it affords, even in
    principle, no unique definition of truth. Any so-called pragmatic
    definition of truth is doomed to failure equally.
    Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)