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Chronic Pain, Stress, Depression, Attempted Suicide
Summary
This patient, a 34 year old policewoman, was referred to us
as "an emergency" by her therapist who feared another suicide attempt
by her. She had already been hospitalized for one nearly successful suicide
attempt. The therapist sent us an in-depth analysis of the patient which
depicted an extremely disturbed person. She had clinically significant levels
of Hysteria, Hypochondriasis, Paranoia, and Depression, the most serious being
acute Depression.
The patient was suffering from a work-related injury which
had left her disabled (unable to perform police work), and plagued by
unremitting pain and its attendant psychological stress for seven years. The
Patient presented us with her own typed list of over 40 somatic complaints.
The patient was bitter, angry, and hostile almost to the point of physical
attack as a result of the "Catch-22" situation in which she found
herself regarding her employment. The Police department found her too disabled
enough to be retired with a pension. In what appeared to be an effort to avoid
the expense of paying her a disability pension, the department had shunted the
patient from one evaluation to another by the department's own
"experts". The patient had only bitter things to say about doctors
and psychiatrists.
The patient arrived at our treatment facility discouraged,
depressed, withdrawn, and in constant pain. She cried continuously the first
two days, complaining of constant pain, dizziness, and despair at never getting
well. She seemed unaware of those around her and was totally self-absorbed.
By the third day of training she began to acknowledge the presence of others
and to cry less. By the fourth day of training she began to be playful with the
training staff, and by the seventh day of training she stated, "I cannot
remember back, ...I cannot remember that far [back] when... was the last time I
felt peace: and all the psychiatrists that I've seen... and all those other
people couldn't understand what I really wanted when I told them I wasn't
looking for a handout, or this or that. All I wanted was peace, and yesterday
on the way home I felt peace... just total and complete peace. In the past 5
years, even on good days, I never felt as good". (Ref. S.S. Transcript,
session 7)
By the end of the 10th training session, the patient was
using the words "optimistic" and "joyful" to describe her
state of mind (Ref. S.S Transcript, session 10). The battery of personality
tests administered after the 7th day of training showed that the clinical
scales mentioned above had all dropped to well below the level of clinical
significance, with an especially significant drop in depression.
A few weeks after the training, the patient came back for a
visit glowing with enthusiasm and happiness. She told us that friends and
therapists alike could not fathom the sudden and remarkable change. A few
weeks later she scheduled another member of her therapy group, also a disabled
police officer, for our brain energy training program. A few months after the
training, the patient returned to school, receiving all "A's" her
first semester. She continues to express the hope of being able to work with
us one day when we expand our facilities and need more training assistants.
Data Analysis
One of the best ways of determining the existence of a
relationship between treatment outcome and learned changes in brain energy is
to perform correlations (Pearson product moment correlations) on data which
relates EEG changes to mood and personality changes. Left and Right Occipital
Alpha changes were separately computed and correlated with changes in the
patient's mood and emotional state. The Clyde Mood Scale showed increases
of "Friendliness" when the patient increased her right occipital
alpha. "Aggressiveness" was reduced significantly by increased right
occipital alpha (r= -.55, p<.05), and this tendency was also seen with left
occipital alpha increases. Both right and left occipital alpha increases had
significant ability to pull her out of the "Sleepy" state into which
she retreated for pain relief. The left occipital alpha energy correlated
negatively with "Sleepiness" (r= -.72, p<.01), as did the right
occipital alpha (r= -.61 p<.03). In addition "Unhappiness" tended
to be reduced in proportion to increases in right occipital alpha.
The Profile of Mood States (POMS) also showed that mood
changes were linked to changes in brain energy. Increases in right occipital
alpha were linked to reductions in "Tension/Anxiety",
"Depression/Dejection", "Confusion/Bewilderment",
"Anger/Hostility", and "Fatigue". Increases in left
occipital alpha had an even stronger tendency to reduce "Fatigue,"
but failed to reduce "Confusion" or "Anger". Some of the
greatest effects were seen during the first four days when the patient was
choosing life over suicide. Increases of both right and left occipital alpha
correlated positively with increased "Vigor".
The Multiple Affect Adjective Check List (MAACL) measures
Anxiety, Depression, and Hostility. All three of these bad moods tended to
correlate negatively with changes in right occipital alpha. Thus when right
occipital alpha increased, there were decreases in Anxiety, Depression, and
Hostility, as measured by MAACL.
Perhaps the most remarkable measures of the changes
occurred on the clinical scales of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality
Inventory (MMPI). The scales are measured in percentiles, with anything above
the 70th percentile indicating a clinically significant degree of personality
disturbance. The patient's changes after her training were extraordinary. Her
Depression dropped from the 100th percentile to the 57th (a drop of 43
percentile points!); this change moved her from maximally disturbed to
"normal". Her Psychopathic Deviancy (PD) dropped from 71 to 54, to
"normal". Her Paranoia (PA) dropped from 76 to 59, again to
"normal". She also became less Socially Introverted (SI) dropping
from 79 to 55. Her Schizophrenia (SC) and Psychaesthenia (PT) both dropped to
61 from initial values of 72 and 73, respectively. A psychiatrist who had
interviewed her right before and just after her training described the results
as, "truly a transformation, ... miraculous". Before the year had
ended, this psychiatrist himself had become a Trainee and had completed the
seven day Level 1 Training Program for the purpose of managing the stress which
had led him into heart surgery.
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