Depression - Why haven't we solved it?

Approximately 280 million people worldwide have depression. Several more suffer from an undiagnosed condition.

But have you wondered why we have been unsuccessful in solving depression?

Modern medicine has transplanted livers and hearts. Doctors can open your skull and operate on your brain with precision. We can transfuse blood, repair bone, remove cataracts.

What is it about depression that makes it so hard to solve?

Modern medicine has done extremely well by taking a reductionist approach to the human body.

So it takes a cardiovascular problem and reduces it until it figures out what is going on. So it will look at your arteries and veins. It will look at the blood flowing. It will inspect blockages and similar obstacles.

By breaking the problem down to the smallest unit, it can then figure out what needs solving.

Unfortunately, we have been unsuccessful with depression.

We have theories. Serotonin has been identified as one cause. So we have been given selective serotonin reputake inhibitors also know as SSRI’s. It has helped but not solved the problem.

Therapy is another direction. So we have developed the school of cognitive behavior therapy. It has helped but not solved the problem.

Unlike other conditions, we are yet to successfully take a reductionist approach to depression. The brain and its functioning is complex. The biochemistry of emotions and feeling even more so.

In fact we are still struggling to confidently declare whether our emotions are driven by the gut, brain or heart. Yes, your heart also has neurons.

One path forward is to successfully identify the cause and solve it.

Or perhaps we should stop viewing it solely as a chemical imbalance or brain malfunction. Instead, recognize it as a message from the body, urging us to change our approach to healing.

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