Vikram Patel's Model Of Depression

Psychology and mental health is a field that is constantly evolving, with new information on our brain and how we think being uncovered every day, it seems as though the possibilities in terms of what we’ll find out next are endless. While reading through scientific journals I stumbled across findings that were in my opinion either important discoveries, or important findings. The first one being the fact that 90% in countries like India and China nearly 90% of patients were diagnosed with depression, but none received care. This information led Psychologist Vikram Patel to develop and introduce the “staged” model of depression. Vikram Patel is a well-known psychologist who constantly advocates for low income, middle income, and third world

This was important to the field of mental health because it eases conversations about depression, and assists the middle to low income populations within these countries to receive the help they desperately need. Patel’s model introduces a different perspective in which people would analyze depression, by breaking it down into several stages that would in turn help people understand depression, and creating a customized treatment that many could carry out on their own. Not only does Patel’s model open the discussion on depression, but also it allows those suffering with depression to educate themselves, and receive the proper treatment, this model increases the detection rates. In the article that Vikram Patel published on PLOS medicine, he explains how the binary classification of depression is what causes such low detection rates, and the way to improve these rates is by opening the door to the idea of a staged model, which also looks at the varying symptoms in

One major controversy in psychology is the effectiveness of diagnosing by using the DSM, also known as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, and the most recent changes referred to, as the DSM5 has become a heated topic of conversation for psychologists within the community. The American Psychiatric Association publishes this diagnostic tool, which sets the standard for how professionals within the field diagnose, and treat mental health illnesses. The new manual is controversial because it removed and added several conditions, for example they removed Asperger’s disorder, and according to an article published on Foxnews they added conditions such as cannabis withdrawal, and gambling addiction. The issue arises when one begins to discuss things like funding for grants, insurance coverage, and the proposal or changes of health care policies. The DSM5 created such major changes, one of them being the grouping of autism subcategories, many psychologists believe that this will decrease the amount of false positives that occur when diagnosing. Although the changes to the manual may seem negative, some like the changes to the categorization of autism can allow health professionals to be more detailed when diagnosing autism. Aside from the DSM5 the diagnosing and treatment of bipolar disorder in young children has been very controversial, mainly because it is theorized that some children do not actually