Month: January 2019

Today I want to touch on another therapy that people may not have heard much about – transcranial magnetic stimulation, also known as TMS.

According to the Mayo Clinic’s webpage on the topic (https://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/transcranial-magnetic-stimulation/about/pac-20384625), TMS is a noninvasive procedure that involves magnetic fields to stimulate nerve cells in the brain.  This in turn can help improve symptoms of depression.  TMS involves repetitive magnetic pulses, and during a session an electromagnetic coil is placed on your scalp near your forehead.  The idea is that the pulses can help to activate regions of the brain that have decreased activity in depression.

TMS has shown promise for depression, and has some advantages over ECT (electroconvulsive therapy, also known as “shock” therapy).  ECT involves anesthesia, whereas TMS does not.  ECT also causes seizures as a part of treatment, but this is not intended in TMS (although seizures are an uncommon possible side effect of TMS).  Common side effects with TMS include headaches, scalp discomfort at the site of stimulation, lightheadedness, and tingling, twitching, or spasms of facial muscles, so TMS is not completely free of possible issues.  However, for many with depression TMS appears to be a better alternative to ECT.

Unfortunately, TMS is not available everywhere, and there are also potential issues with cost.  And, while some insurance covers TMS, others have been slow to cover it.  But, my hope is that these access and cost issues will start to be addressed more efficiently in the future.

What do you think?  Does TMS sound like a promising therapy for depression?  So far, the data appears to be positive, but TMS is fairly new, and more information is being researched.  Regardless, for depression patients TMS can be yet another tool that can help patients enter recovery.  My hope is that this treatment continues to expand and help more people affected by depression.

In my last post, I talked about cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and how it can be used in depression.  A lot of people have heard about or experienced CBT, so it may be a topic that people are very familiar with.  Today, I want to touch on a different type of therapy that I had never heard about until a few weeks ago, and I would like to introduce it to you today.

Instead of CBT, this therapy is CET, which stands for cognitive enhancement therapy.  According to the website, http://www.cognitiveenhancementtherapy.com/, CET is a performance based, comprehensive, and developmental approach to the rehabilitation of social cognitive and neurocognitive deficits.  CET is designed as a recovery phase intervention for persons with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder who are symptomatically stable, but who nonetheless remain socially and vocationally disabled.  Participants work at recovery through structured group and computer exercises.   Overall, CET attempts to increase mental stamina, active information processing, and the spontaneous negotiation of unrehearsed social challenges.  It does so with a focus on enhancing perspective taking, social context appraisal, and other components of social cognition.  CET is evidence based, and can also be a cost effective strategy involved in treating schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder.

Needless to say, I do not know much about CET, but since it is evidence based, that can lend more credit to the effectiveness of this therapy.  And, while I spend most of my time focusing on depression, I think this therapy is definitely something to consider in the area of schizophrenia.  My goal for this post was to at least make everyone aware that there is CET and that it can help.

How about you?  Have you ever heard of cognitive enhancement therapy?  Is this a topic you want to learn more about?  Are you touched by schizophrenia in any way and could see a benefit in trying this therapy?