Now that we have the ability to see inside the brain without opening anyone's skull, we'll be able to map and define brain activity and peg it to behavior and feelings. Right? Well, maybe not, or maybe not just yet. It seems the workings of our brains are rather too complex and diverse across individuals to really say for certain what a brain scan says about a person. But Nobel prize winner Eric Kandel and researcher Cynthia Fu tell us about groundbreaking work in the field of depression that just may help us toward better diagnosis and treatment.Anything that helps us treat a disease better is welcome. Doctors have been led astray before by misunderstanding a disease and what makes it better. Neurologist Robert Sapolsky tells us about the turn of the last century, when doctors discovered that babies who died inexplicably in their sleep had thymus glands that seemed far too large. Blasting them with radiation shrank them effectively, and so was administered to perfectly healthy children to prevent this sudden infant death syndrome...Leadership support for Radiolab’s science programming is provided by the Simons Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation. Foundational support for Radiolab was provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Chapter 1: What is the significance of Mental Health Awareness Month?
This is Radiolab. I'm Lulu Miller. It's May, which means we are right in the middle of Mental Health Awareness Month. And because of that, I found myself thinking about an episode we did many years ago about what was at the time a brand new way of peeking inside the brain to try to see various mental health conditions like depression and many other things. It's a fascinating piece.
And while it was recorded 17 years ago, and you'll find some of the language reflects that time, the question at the heart of the story is really timeless, really provocative, really fascinating. So we are going to air it today. And at the end, I will be back with a short update on where some of the technology has come in the subsequent years. So here we go.
Buckle up with the episode called How to Cure What Ails You.
Okay.
Alright. Okay.
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Radiolab.
From WNYC. WNYC.
Hello, I'm Jad Abumrad. And I'm Robert Krulwich. This is Radiolab. This hour we're talking about diagnosis.
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Chapter 2: How has brain imaging changed the diagnosis of depression?
The amygdala sees the emotion on the faces at that moment.
And the machine... It's like tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. And there were hundreds of pictures.
Tenth of a second to tenth of a second to tenth of a second.
That's right.
Did you see a difference between the people who were depressed and the people who were normal?
Yes.
Was it a significant difference or a just barely difference?
As a group, it was a significant difference.
And now she takes the big step.
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