The book Nutrient Power by Dr William Walsh outlines ground breaking work in functional psychiatry. The problem is that he has been publishing his work for the last 30 years … and I only discovered his work within the last year. It really makes me wonder what conventional medicine is waiting for sometimes. According to his research, the positive outcomes he achieved for very sick patients suffering from Schizophrenia was over 90%. And with medication so poorly tolerated by this specific psychiatric population, it makes no sense for “western” medicine not to take a serious look at this work.
Schizophrenia affects roughly 1% of the population, but even with a relatively small prevalence compared to depression, this condition can have devastating effects on relationships. Suffers tend to have delusions as one of the more common manifestations of the disease, which typically involves people being “out to get them” and a lot of the time this can be a direct family member that is actually the one trying to help the person. This is likely why family’s of people with this devastating disease are actually broken apart and many times sufferers do not receive the medical attention they need and end up on the street.
Parallel to the work of Dr Abram Hoffer, the father of orthomolecular medicine, and Dr Carl Pfeiffer a well known pioneer in orthomolecular psychiatry, I believe Dr Walsh takes this work one step further. Dr Walsh proposes fairly simple categorizations of the condition with objective measures of assessment which is likely why his treatments are so successful. Essentially he uses 5 “biotypes” that categorize patients based on laboratory evaluation. The biotypes are overmethylators (42%), undermethylators (28%), pyrrole disorders (20%), gluten intolerance (4%) and other (6%). The other category may include problems like heavy metal toxicity, including the toxicity of copper, mercury or lead, among other toxins.
The common symptom profiles for three of these different biotypes are as follows and specific testing should be done to determine a biotype before any treatment is recommended. Walsh takes this one step further in suggesting that there is a degree of medical misconduct if at least some of the evaluations for his subtypes are not completed prior to treatment.
Next blog I will be looking at depression!
| Overmethylated Schizophrenics | Undermethylated Schizophrenia | Pyrrole |
| Auditory hallucinationsHigh Anxiety and Panic
Hyperactivity Low Libido Religiosity Low Histamine Paranoia Depression Sleep Disorder Tinnitus Upper body/Neck and Head Pain Hirsutism Low Basophils Tendency to be overweight Nervous legs, pacing Postpardum onset Adverse reaction to SSRI Improvement with Benzos Dry eyes and mouth Low motivation High pain threshold Paranoid – Schizo Dx Food sensitivities Artistic or Musical Copper overload Antihistamines intolerance Adverse rxn to SAMe Improvement w lithium History of eczema Self-mutilation Obsessions Absence of seasonal allergies Frenetic activity |
Severe delusionsHistory of perfectionism
Seasonal inhalants allergies Very high libido Dx of delusional disorder OCD tendencies Self-motivated in school Dietary inflexibility Dx of Schizoaffective Adverse reaction to benzos Good response to antihistamines High fluidity (tears, saliva) High accomplishment Adverse reaction to folic Sparse hair growth Suicidal Addictive Phobias Infrequent speech Denial Non-compliance Belief that people are after them Low pain tolerance Catatonic Strong-willed Slender Competitive Larger nose and ears Prior dx of OCD Ritualistic Calm demeanour but high inner tension Frequent Headaches Family history of high accomplishment Blank-minded appearance Poor concentration Social isolation |
Extreme mood swingsSensitivity to light and noise
Poor stress control Severe anxiety Little or no dream recall Morning nausea Very dry skin Pale; inability to tan High irritability Severe oxidation Affinity for spicy food Abnormal fat distribution Delicate facial features Extreme moods History of reading problems Underachievement Autoimmune disorders While spots on nails Stretch marks Coarse eyebrows Poor growth Fear of airplane travel Obsessive negative thoughts Delayed puberty Severe depression Dark or mauve-colored urine Abnormal EEG Sever inner tension Frequent infections Premature greying Abnormal menstrual periods LUQ pain or Spleen Pain Severe anxiety Historic behaviour Join pains poor wound healing Psoriasis Tendency to stay up late |
Counselling may also be helpful. Consider Betterhelp – https://www.betterhelp.com/sta