Outline and Evaluate the Biological Treatments of OCD

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Outline and Evaluate the Biological Treatments of OCD

        One biological treatment of OCD is Psychosurgery which is a surgical intervention that aims to treat a behaviour for which no pathological cause can be established. The patient must meet certain criteria before they can be considered for this surgery, for example the illness must have persisted for longer than 5 years, all other treatments have been tested and failed to provide relief, and the patient must be between the ages of 26 and 65. The main idea of the procedure is that it attempts to interrupt nerve pathways in areas of the brain implicated in OCD. Probes are inserted through the skull into the cingulated girus, the part of the brain that allows the OFC to talk to the basal ganglia. The probe tips are then heated and the tissue is burned. The operation can also be conducted using external radiation. This procedure is known as a cingulotomy.

        One strength of this procedure is that research has shown that it is very effective. One supporting study of this is that Baer (1995) reported that a cingulotomy was successful in decreasing anxiety and OCD behaviour. In addition, Dougherty et al (2002) supported this as he suggested that up to 45% of patients had a reduction in OCD symptoms, therefore suggesting a casual cause and effect relationship between psychosurgery and reduction in OCD symptoms, therefore strengthening the internal validity of the treatment. Therefore these two studies support the idea that Cingulotomy is an effective treatment of OCD. However it has been argued by Koran (2007) that these studies may have been biased because they are unblended meaning that the researchers know the treatments received by their patients and therefore expectation may influence their judgement. This implies that the internal validity is lower than previously thought due to the presence of demand characteristics as a confounding variable and therefore may not be as effective as we initially thought.

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        Another issue surrounding Psychosurgery is the appropriateness of it as a treatment as it is irreversible and could cause significant side effects for the patient. One study that suggests that this treatment is not appropriate is a case study of Mary Lou Zimmerman who had suffered from OCD for many years and had tried drugs to treat her disorder but had been unsuccessful. Therefore doctors performed surgery on this woman and as a result of the operation, she was unable to walk, stand or eat without help. This case study was conducted by Carey (2003) who found that ethical considerations ...

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Summary The writer should have defined OCD in the introduction and then gone on to describe in more detail how OCD can affect behaviour. The writer should also make it clear that it is an anxiety disorder. Then the main biological considerations could have been described e.g. brain activity, neurotransmitters and genetics. The treatments for this could then have followed on. Finally, a conclusion could have been reached using all the studies which have been carried out past and present. Although the writer has discussed psychosurgery and drug treatments, genetics have not been mentioned. With better planning, a good introduction and conclusion, the writer could improve upon this score. Score 3*