Psychiatrist and author Daniel Amen made an appearance on the View to discuss ADHD and brain injuries
The Washington Post declared Dr. Daniel Amen as the most popular psychiatrist in America. The same article goes on to say “clinical psychiatry is often as much art as science” since there are not a standardized testing protocols and instruments for mental health issues like depression, ADHD, or bipolar disorder, like those that exist for cholesterol and blood sugar levels. “In most cases, success is determined by patients’ perceptions and behavior. If they say they feel better, and act like it, then they are. No psychiatrist bats 1.000, and there is no X-ray to prove a mental break has been healed.”
While Dr. Amen may be a bit controversial among some of his peers, it’s hard to ignore a psychiatrist who has performed over 86,000 brain scans. His supporters attribute the fierce criticism as the inevitable response to being a trailblazer in the field of psychiatry and understanding adult ADHD.
Video Transcript:
I first met Dr. Daniel Amen when he was here with Pastor Rick Warren a few weeks ago, and I was so fascinated by his book “Healing ADD’ that I asked him back here today. Please welcome Dr. Daniel Amen. Welcome, let’s get to it. I know we’re all very excited. Can you explain exactly what is ADD?
Dr. Amen:
Well it’s a condition that usually is inherited, short attention span, distractibility, restlessness, impulse control problems, and it’s not just something that happens this week, it’s something that you can actually see evidence of throughout a person’s life.
Jenny:
So is it becoming more diagnosed or are there actually more people getting ADD?
Dr. Amen:
Well actually it’s much more common, the population used to have one or two of these kids in a classroom but now there’s seven or eight of them, and one of the reasons if you have ADD you have problems with impulse control, which means you have children younger, and you have more of them, and that one…
Jenny:
So they’re more risque?
Dr. Amen:
So they have more risk taking behavior, but then if you add the lousy food, the low exercise, less sun, which is important, and then a constant addiction to gadgets, that’s one of the reasons that we’re seeing more of it.
Barbara:
But doctor, is it genetic? And if it is, what can you do about it?
Dr. Amen:
It is clearly genetic. In fact one of the things, if we see an ADD child one of the next things we do is screen their mom and dad…
Mary:
What are the chances that they are positive, or that they are ADD?
Dr. Amen:
So probably 60 to 70% of the time if we see it in a child we’ll also see it in the mother or the father.Jenny:
I actually had him scan my brain. I went into your clinic, and I wanted to show, let’s show everyone what you came up with, the results.
Dr. Amen:
Well you wanted to actually quit smoking, and so you came to see me. And as I was talking to you I’m thinking, “I think she has ADD,” and when…
Jenny:
As I was like this with my phone, “what do you mean?”
Dr. Amen:
And so at the Amen Clinic we actually do imaging. So, I think you know, psychiatrists are the only medical doctors that never look at the organ they treat. I’m a psychiatrist, and for 22 years we’ve been looking at the brain, and what we saw in Jenny’s brain. So these are two SPECT Scans. The one on the left is her brain at rest, when she’s not doing anything, and when she tries to concentrate here’s the one on the right, the front part of her brain drops, and the memory center drops, and so that’s classically what we see in ADD. The harder you try the worse it gets. So people say, “Oh, try harder.” That doesn’t work well, or, “you’re lazy,” or, “if only you gave more effort.” The problem is that constant failure leads to self-esteem problems and later, you know, there’s a higher incidence in ADD of divorce, incarceration, job changes, even obesity.
Mary:
When we say we want a man to appreciate us for our brain this is all we’re looking for: just a nice scan, a pointer, a laser pointer.
Dr. Amen:
Well the thing I love about you is after you saw your scan you developed this concept we call “brain envy.” You like immediately stopped smoking, started to take supplements, because there’s lots of natural ways to do it.
Barbara:
If you know that you have ADD, and it’s in the family what do you do? Do you take something, are there drugs, are there pills, what do you do?
Dr. Amen:
Well there’s certain lifestyle interventions that make a big difference. There are medicines, but you know the reason Ritalin is controversial is it really works well for some people and it’s a nightmare for other people. So in my book “Healing ADD” I actually talk about seven different types of Attention Deficit Disorder. It’s not one thing. And if you never look at people’s brains you never know, so you could make all sorts of…
Jenny:
Individualized treatment.
Dr. Amen:
It’s critical, that’s what I found.
Barbara:
You go to a doctor for an examination so he tests your heart, and your lungs, and so-forth, but doesn’t usually test you for that so what do you do about that? Do you go to a psychiatrist and say, “Please test me.”
Dr. Amen:
Well, psychiatrists have the most experience in understanding and treating ADD/ADHD.
Jenny:
If it’s affecting your life I think negatively, there’s some people that say, “I like my ADD. I’m able to multi-task,” and there is a part of it that I do like. But there’s also a part that can affect relationships or your family, where you’re very distracted, and that’s also why…
Dr. Amen:
And even if you are successful like you, when you optimize your brain you can be even more successful, but without the chronic stress of always having to wait until the last minute to get things done.
Jenny:
That’s right, where I do best under pressure doesn’t have to be the case.
Mary:
Dr. Amen I love this brain imaging stuff. You said a lot of people don’t look at the brain, a lot of psychologists don’t look at the brain, many of them say, “Well this technology hasn’t gotten to the clinical stage yet, it’s only for research, what do you say to those folks?
Dr. Amen:
It’s nonsense. We’ve been doing it for 22 years, and without imaging you miss head injury. So one of the things we should be talking about, we did the largest study on active and retired NFL Players, and you know after we’ve looked at 86,000 brain scans it’s so clear to me that it’s a brain damaging sport.
Sherri:
That’s so funny you say that because Dr. Oz was on the show, we talked about that, especially with NFL and kids playing football, and Dr. Oz said that he would absolutely let his kids play football, and you say just the opposite. Would you allow your kids to play football?
Dr. Amen:
Absolutely not.
Jenny:
Tell them what you say to your grandkids.
Sherri:
Even with team sports and everything why would you say no?
Dr. Amen:
Absolutely not, your brain is soft do not let them. Okay, so just look inside a skull. The scull has many sharp bony ridges.
Sherri:
And they say girls playing soccer get hurt as well.
Dr. Amen:
Your brain is the consistency of soft butter, and it controls everything you do, how you think, how you feel, how you act, that (playing contact sports) is just the dumbest idea.
Sherri:
Really?
Dr. Amen:
Children should not be playing contact sports because their brain and Justin Bieber will attest to this…
Barbara:
Well you better tell that to schools.
Mary:
What about women in sports?
Dr. Amen:
So women actually…
Jenny:
One injury can change your brain.
Dr. Amen:
One injury can change your head and change your life, and so for IQ for women 90% of it is in the front part of their brain, for males it’s more widely distributed.
Sherri:
So, even with the helmet?
Dr. Amen:
The helmet will protect you against skull fractures, they do not protect you of dents to brain injury, because if you get hit, your brain rattles inside your head. Imagine those big guys, but for girls, cheerleading is actually the number one cause of concussion in girls.
Whoopi:
People drop you.
Barbara:
Let me ask you if we have time, one very controversial question, because drug companies are disputing this, but it says new studies have shown that for mild depression anti-depressants work no better than placebos, what do you feel about that?
Dr. Amen:
That’s actually for mild or moderate depression…but the problem is the same problem we have with ADD, it’s not one thing in the brain, its seven different things.
Jenny:
We’re going to have to pick up here; everyone’s going to have to pick up your book to learn more. Thank you so much for being here Dr. Amen. Members of our audience are going home with a copy of his book, thank so much to for co-hosting, have a great day. Everyone take a little time to enjoy the view, and pick up his book to learn more “Healing ADD”. Thank you.
In this video excerpt from the television show The View, Dr. Amen discusses ADD/ADHD and brain injury results using SPECT scans (a controversial tool) for diagnosing psychiatric issues.