Posted by Q (198.64.206.92) on March 10, 2000 at 14:22:00:
In Reply to: An explanation of how it (probably) works posted by Flash on March 10, 2000 at 05:36:35:
I feel that psychoactive treatments will be quite effective in dealing with CH, but we need to separate the forest from the trees. My perception is that too much emphasis is placed on matching symptom with treatment while ignoring the entire canvas of the problem.
When I back up from the trees and look at the forest I see the CH-condition as much more intelligent acting than can be explained by isolated physical events. There is too much organization across systems to ignore. I think we can rule out alien control, which leads us to look internal -- directly to the mind itself.
The reason that psychoactive treatments would be effective are not because of the effects on the physical body, but because of their effects on the mind itself. I believe the root of the problem is mental in origin, not physical.
Why would the mind use the CH-pain process? There are at least two comprehensive theories about this at the CH Study Group website (http://www.i-ch.org). I have found no other plausable theory which could explain the forest as a whole. The trees are interesting, but are themselves but symptoms of the root problem. The study of individual symptoms and treatments will eventually fail due to difficulties in explaining the various individual trees. The mind is the only organ with enough power to control the many factors which have to be considered to explain the entirity of CH.
To state it again, the reason psychoactive drugs may be effective in the treatment of CH is that they act on the mind (the psyche). Other side-effects, such as vascular constriction/dialation are just that, side-effects, but not the reason for the effectiveness, nor justification for the use of these powerful substances.
CH seems to be a mental condition (with physical side-effects) and would therefore respond to mind-altering treatments.