Tragedy. It happens. It is a part of human life that we all may face one day. Yet what occurs when the negative and painful experiences from such tragic events become so overwhelming that they impair us in our everyday lives? The mind has its own way of protecting itself from trauma by repressing memories of such events, but neuroscience researchers at Johns Hopkins University are taking matters into their own hands and conducting research that may lead to a drug where doctors can selectively erase painful memories from the minds of human beings.
Research began by administering electric shocks to a group of a hundred or so mice while playing a sound (classical conditioning- so that the mice can associate the pain they received with the sound they heard). “They also administered a drug to some of the mice that kept their brains flooded with AMPARs. Those mice retained the fearful memories of the sound long after the initial jolt, while the drug-free group gradually became inure to it, eventually forgetting the painful experience”. This suggests that AMPARs are essential to the brain’s formation of memory and researcher Joseph E .LeDoux at NYU remarks that “It’s a huge step forward” in developing a drug that serves to block AMPARs and potentially eliminate harmful memories. Dr. Richard Huganir, director of the Neuroscience Department at Johns Hopikins believes that this could serve as a treatment for the 8 million American citizens who suffer from PTSD. People living with PTSD have already contacted Huganir eager to take part in drug trials. While all this seems good and well as a miracle treatment for traumatic experiences, there is a serious underlying ethical issue these researchers seem to be neglecting. Though this drug will no completely erase the painful memories, it will eliminate the strong emotional attachment people have, something that I feel is eerily unnatural.
Humans are, as many people believe, the sum of our experiences. We are shaped by both the positive an negative experiences in our lives. In truly traumatic experiences, I believe a humanistic approach to treatment where individuals can learn and grow from their experiences is perhaps the best way to recover from a traumatic experience. I acknowledge the severity of disorders such as PTSD that result from traumatizing moments in life, yet questions will arise in the future over what constitutes an experience as being traumatic enough to warrant the use of such a drug. There is something slightly inhuman about eliminating emotional attachment to our experiences, and these neuroscientists must be wary of such ethical concerns as the continue with their research.
Sources:
1) http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_50/b4207050515280.htm?campaign_id=rss_null
3 comments:
I agree it is difficult to cement a boundary between trauma and standard pain, but a lack of a boundary does not negate treatment of those definitively clearly in trauma. Just because we cannot define a distinction between gray-area cases does not mean we cannot help the definitively traumatized.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is, by definition, an extreme case of what could be called a pain-trauma continuum. Average cases of PTSD, in fact, contribute to a “’significantly greater risk of suicide attempts than patients with a major depressive episode and no PTSD’” (Oquendo in 1). If this does not establish the PTSD as a result of serious trauma, it at least proves PTSD is significantly worse than even large depression. The ethical question, then, is not centered around the ambiguity of the pain-trauma boundary but rather whether trauma should be treated.
It is invalid to state that PTSD should not be treated because of a reduced ability to grow from experiences. Such a claim is disconcerting for two reasons: it denies autonomy to individuals with PTSD and it superficially offers them a protection that, in fact, does not protect them at all.
The experience argument is especially worrying. Arguing that PTSD should not be treated because individuals should “grow from their experiences” (Seyoum) means denying individuals their fundamental right to pursue happiness. There is no ethical debate. Treatment of these individuals lies well within the duty of medicine, says the Belmont Report (2). Respect should be given towards any individual who strives to make his or her condition better without harming others directly or indirectly. Perhaps some would want to ‘naturally’ learn from experience – these individuals should of course be given the opportunity. The rest may want to simply get out of a circumstance that should never have happened. They should be helped, too. Theirs is not a desire to become emotionless – it is just to remove themselves from pain.
It would seem that retaining PTSD individuals’ ability to self-improve would protect them. This is a dangerous assumption – offering chance to help through self-improvement (instead of directly improving) is simply not the basis of modern medicine. It is pivotal that people with dangerous psychological disorders like PTSD are treated in the same way as those with physiological disorders – i.e. through proven medicine and treatment. Self-improvement is too formless and questionable to justify as an alternative to a soon-to-be technique of helping the unfortunate sufferers of PTSD.
1. http://pn.psychiatryonline.org/content/38/8/37.1.full
2. http://ohsr.od.nih.gov/guidelines/belmont.html#go2
This is a really interesting new medical advancement, and I am not surprised that it has already struck up such intense debates.
Upon reading about this new possibility to "erase" memories, my immediate response was to argue for the unnatural aspect of this drug. I feared that this drug could possibly be used by people wishing for nothing more that rid themselves of a regretful or moderately painful memory. By doing this, we truly would lose an appreciation for our life experiences. I believe that we do learn from our past and that our present and future characteristics are based on our past. Because of this, I would argue strongly against using these memory "erasing" drugs for moderate trauma.
But PSTD is a completely different story. With a disease as serious as this one, it is unnecessary to force someone to "learn" from such traumatic experiences. Especially when considering the increased with of suicide, the only ethical thing to do is cure it when the means to do so become available.
So I really do think that these new drugs have tremendous potential when one considers their possible use to cure PSTD. It just then becomes necessary to regulate the use of these drugs, so that it is only used in such extreme cases. If we allow for unregulated use of these drugs, then we would risk losing an appreciation for the lessons and characteristics gained from our past.
From what I read in the Monitor (a psych journal), the therapy would involve reliving and talking through the memory while on the drug so that the memory and the emotional charge would be less strong the next time the memory is remembered. The drug basically acts to speed the exposure therapy process. This works by recalling the traumatic event, and learning to tolerate the emotional arousal it causes. Traumatic events are so painful because every time you remember them, you experience the emotional pain all over again. If you avoid the memory, you reinforce the fear or pain, and make the experience worse. Exposure therapy involves allowing the patient to recall traumatic memories in a safe setting, and the learning to tolerate the fears and negative emotions. Over time, the emotional response begins to fade as it is “unlearned”. These new drugs will basically speed up this process, by making it harder to relearn the fear, and making it easier for some individuals to tolerate the emotions. The current treatments are basically anti-anxiety drugs, which prevent the patient from feeling the emotions in the first place. These drugs will reduce the symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder, such as panic attacks, but they won’t do anything to help them deal with the memories in the long run. The new drugs are not cheating: you still need to be in therapy to get the effects. All they do is make the existing methods of healing more effective.
http://www.apa.org/monitor/2010/10/memories.aspx
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