Adjust your brain

BOOK REVIEW I do anatomize and cut up these poor beasts, he said to Hippocrates, to see the cause of these distempers, vanities, and follies, which are the burden of all creatures.-Democritus (1) Dualism, a belief in a fundamental opposition in all things like the body and the mind, good and evil, right and wrong, is found throughout ancient civilization. Dualism was expanded by John Cottingham(2) to include sensation, and the theory of trialism, or three opposing forces, evolved. Paul Fitzgerald Ph.D. presents his contemporary version of trialism " The Big Three " (Norepinephrine, Serotonin, Dopamine) in his new book " Adjust Your Brain " which will be released in October 2007. Dr. Fitzgerald is a native of Lafayette, Indiana. He attended Indiana University on the Wells Scholarship and graduated with highest distinction and a B.S. in biology in 1995. He attended neuroscience graduate school at Johns Hopkins, eventually finishing his Ph.D. in 2005. His brain mapping research has been published in several peer reviewed journals, including Nature and The Journal of Neuroscience. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2000. Dr. Fitzgerald writes of his struggle to find an effective combination of available therapies. His goal: to allow him to continue his life's pursuits and contribute to society. If his narrative had merely described the plight of a well educated man coping with a debilitating disease it would have been noteworthy. Dr. Fitzgerald took it one step further by attempting to turn psychiatry, as it is practiced now, on its head. The book is an interesting read on several levels. His depiction of personal struggles with mental illness will educate clinicians and students alike. Sad, yet inspiring, his ability to find a treatment that allowed some normalcy gives hope to sufferers of mental disease. More interesting, and far more controversial, is his assertion that everyone can do the same thing by bucking conventional psychiatry and " Adjusting Your Brain. " Dr. Fitzgerald proposes that the current version of the major psychiatric text, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV-TR) is merely a " caricature of the truth(3). " His theory is that, like the four humors of Hippocrates, the brain, and indeed all mental illness, is derived from specific quantities of three main neurotransmitters (Norepinephrine, Serotonin, Dopamine) and their adjustment. Dr. Fitzgerald draws on his own experience, the writings of Michael Nordin(4) and Peter Kramer(5), and from …