Depression is not Merely a “Mood Disorder”

Stahmeyer et al. gave an instructive overview of the state of care for persons in the diagnostic category” depression” within the German health insurance system.. The authors speculate that guideline based healthcare services, especially pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy, are insufficiently implemented and accessed (1).

One might, however, argue critically that the general belief in the global effectiveness of pharmacological as well as psychological treatment modalities is not well founded. Stefan Weinmann in his critical book “Die Vermessung der Psychiatrie “[Surveying Psychiatric Practice] pointed out the deceptions and self-deceptions of the psychiatric disciplines. Almost every week I receive calls for help from desperate patients, who have been through their fifth or sixth antidepressive medication, have unsuccessfully received two or three psychological treatments, or attempted mindfulness trainings (which—although currently heavily promoted—often are counterintuitive in severely depressed patients [3]). American studies have shown that especially patients with a diagnosis of depression often turn to “complimentary ” methods, including different forms of massages. This is easily explained: Depression is not primarily a “mood disorder” with “accompanying somatic symptoms,” but—as Thomas Fuchs and others have argued —it is a somatic illness with significant changes of the essential interoceptive processes that regulate our general state of health i.e. our “Gemeingefühl “ as former German researchers had named it.

Against this background the findings of controlled studies seem plausible, which have unequivocally shown the antidepressive efficacy of various manual treatments. (2, 3). The proved effectiveness of professional touch in a wide range of indications from neonatology to geriatric and palliative medicine, advocate the establishment of touch medicine as a new and important medical discipline.