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- Tags: crítica dsm investigación psicoterapia
[!summary]Psychiatric diagnoses listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) are not diseases or causes of symptoms, but rather descriptive labels for symptoms. They do not explain the underlying causes of mental health problems. The DSM was not designed to address causes, only to describe effects. Psychiatric diagnoses should not be treated as equivalent to medical diseases, as they are categorically different. The American Psychiatric Association acknowledges that patients with the same diagnosis may have different disturbances and may not respond to the same treatments. However, there is a discrepancy between this understanding and the way DSM diagnoses are often discussed and treated in the field of psychiatry. [!note]
Artículo muestra cómo los diagnósticos psiquiátricos son descriptivos, no etiológicos; es decir, no explican nada. Los editores del DSM-V lo reconocen, declarando que dos personas con el mismo diagnóstico pueden tenerlo por causas distintas y requerir abordajes diversos, pero la investigación en psicoterapia se desarrolla sobre estas mismas categorías.
Highlights
id676343702
Diagnoses listed in the DSM—the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the so-called bible of psychiatry—do not cause anything. They are not things. They are agreed-upon labels—a kind of shorthand—for describing symptoms. Generalized anxiety disorder means a person has been anxious or worried for six months or longer and it’s bad enough to cause problems—nothing else. The diagnosis is description, not explanation. Saying anxiety is caused by generalized anxiety disorder makes as much sense as saying anxiety is caused by anxiety.
id676343995
The ever-expanding list of entries in the DSM sound like medical diseases, especially with the ominously-appended term disorder, but they are not. If we speak of generalized anxiety disorder or major depressive disorder as if they are equivalent to pneumonia or diabetes, we are committing a logical fallacy called a category error. A category error means ascribing a property to something that cannot possess it—like emotions to a rock
id676344028
When the National Institute of Mental Health concluded that DSM diagnostic categories do not and cannot map underlying causes—and therefore cannot be a foundation for mental health research—the American Psychiatric Association agreed. “DSM, at its core… is a guidebook to help clinicians describe,” the chair of the DSM-5 Task Force wrote in response. “It provides clinicians with a common language.”
id676347066
The American Psychiatric Association says patients with the same diagnosis do not necessarily have the same disturbances or respond to the same treatments. Then researchers develop treatment manuals for DSM diagnoses. Professional organizations publish practice guidelines for DSM diagnoses. Health insurers ask providers to follow treatment algorithms for DSM diagnoses.