by Nassir Ghaemi | Jun 14, 2023 | Education
Anxiety is the “fever” of psychiatry. Fever is a completely nonspecific symptom, which happens in many illnesses, and frequently without any illness. Fever “disorders” are meaningless. Similarly, anxiety is a nonspecific symptom, which is quite common, sometimes...
by Nassir Ghaemi | Jun 14, 2023 | Education
The basic principle of treating bipolar illness is simple: Maximize mood stabilizers; avoid antidepressants. The corollary is: Antipsychotics are not mood stabilizers. So treatment means taking true mood stabilizers, defined as drugs which have been proven to prevent...
by Nassir Ghaemi | Jun 14, 2023 | Education
“Depression” is not a diagnosis. It is a syndrome, a collection of signs and symptoms, like fever. It can happen in different diseases, and it can happen without any disease – just like fever. The biggest mistake made today is to treat “depression” with...
by Nassir Ghaemi | Apr 18, 2023 | Blog posts
Doctor: I’m giving you Cymbalta (duloxetine). Patient: I got manic and suicidal on SSRIs. Is it an SSRI? Doctor: Don’t worry. It’s a SNRI. Patient: Oh. This 19 year old male had experienced worsened suicidality twice previously with fluoxetine and sertraline. He knew...
by Nassir Ghaemi | Jan 30, 2023 | Curbside Consults
Q. I have an 18 year old female with a history of depression who had been stable on citalopram. She had never had a manic/hypomanic episode. She complained of diminished libido and chose to switch to bupropion rather than add a medication to address it. We decided to...
