Study Shows How Child Abuse Changes the Brain

Mon, Dec 5 2011 By Kate Kelland 

I came across this study while doing some research & thought it might be worthwhile sharing with you. LONDON (Reuters) ­ Children exposed to family violence show the same pattern of activity in their brains as soldiers exposed to combat, scientists said on Monday. In a study in the journal Current Biology, researchers used brain scans to explore the impact of physical abuse or domestic violence on children's emotional development and found that exposure to it was linked to increased activity in two brain areas when children were shown pictures of angry faces. 

Previous studies that scanned the brains of soldiers exposed to violent combat situations showed the same pattern of heightened activity in these two brain areas ­­ the anterior insula and the amygdala ­­ which experts say are associated with detecting potential threats. This suggests that both maltreated children and soldiers may have adapted to become "hyper­aware" of danger in their environment, the researchers said. "Enhanced reactivity to a...threat cue such as anger may represent an adaptive response for these children in the short term, helping keep them out of danger," said Eamon McCrory of Britain's University College London, who led the study. 

Mainstream Therapies for Treating PTSD Found to be Faulty!

I'm beginning with this first blog by referencing another entitled: How Effective Are PTSD Treatments for Veterans? by Alexandra Sifferlin @acsifferlin published on Aug. 4, 2015. I've chosen to start here in order to kick off my ongoing concern regarding the faulty assumptions treatment providers (healers) have been given related to our current main stream treatments for PTSD. Unfortunately, leading entities such as insurance companies, the VA, etc., have required treatment for this condition to be thoroughly researched for their efficacy prior to acceptance for applied use. Unfortunately, this requirement has locked in treatment that has been found to be less than satisfactory in its long-term outcome thereby 'institutionalizing' these interventions. Applying these faulty interventions as the 'gold standard' because of the numerous research done on them over the years has blocked the use of truly effective treatments based on advances forthcoming from neuroscience. It's time to address the enormous issue of PTSD both for our veteran population as well as civilian PTSD impacted survivors as the national emergency that it truly is. It's time to bring together the collective expertise of those skilled in research with those experienced in the world of the treatment provider to find solutions that work to end the misery emanating from trauma. It's time to come up with a credible measure such as the fMRI or EEG markers of PTSD to measure all treatments for PTSD across the board. It's time for funds to be made available from our national government, foundations, individual donors, etc., concerned with the multi-generational disturbance forthcoming from PTSD to an end by finding an effective way to accomplish this objective. "A new study suggests commonly used first-line treatments for PTSD in veterans may not work as well as medical experts once thought. Recent data show that more than 200,000 Vietnam War veterans still have PTSD, and other research shows that around 13% of Iraq or Afghanistan veterans who experienced combat have PTSD. As TIME previously reported, PTSD diagnoses among deployed troops grew by 400% from 2004 to 2012. . . The Journal of the American Medical Association, reveals that go-to treatments for the disorder may not be as effective as many in the medical community may have believed or hoped. To reach their findings, researchers from the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Veterans Center for Post-Traumatic Stress and Traumatic Brain Injury at NYU Langone Medical Center reviewed 36 randomized control trials of psychotherapy treatments for veterans suffering from PTSD over a 35-year span. Two of the most commonly used treatments—and the most widely studied—are cognitive processing therapy (CPT) and prolonged exposure (PE) therapy. . . The research showed that while up to 70% of the men and women who received CPT or PE experienced symptom improvements, around two-thirds of people receiving the treatments still met the criteria for a PTSD diagnosis after treatment. . . The researchers say other treatment options should continue to be explored, and there are practitioners who are trying different methods, from acupuncture to healing touch therapy. Another new study published Tuesday in JAMA looked at 116 veterans with PTSD who either underwent mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy that focused on being present and non-judgmental in the moment or a present-centered group therapy that focused on current life problems. The results showed that those in the mindfulness group had a greater improvement in self-reported PTSD symptom severity. However, they were no more likely to lose their PTSD diagnosis. There may not be a cure yet for PTSD, but the amount of research looking into how to improve or innovate treatments is encouraging."