Always a bit scary when people experiment on themselves. I've never understood why people would put their own brain at risk, either through untested drugs or untested therapies.
I can understand why people with depression are drawn towards it. The very nature of the condition leads to desperation in trying to escape it. If you have had depression for a long time and conventional therapy or medication seems to have failed any avenue which can relieve it becomes viable, whether that's micro-doses of hallucinogenics or something that previously you would have considered extreme like the zapping in the article.
Most of my hobbies are past what most people would consider safe, but I am never phased by it. Statistically, I am much more likely to be injured or die than most people, but I value experiences more than safety. Everyone weighs their risk-benefit analysis differently.
Having had experience with pharmaceutical therapies for ADHD and depression, I must say that the paternalistic medical approach towards those leave a lot to be desired.
You generally need to see a doctor or prescribing nurse on a monthly basis in order to get a prescription. The value of this visit seems to be fairly low, however; all of the monitoring they do is purely through self reporting, so they are relying on someone going through complex mental issues to self report accurately about whether something is helping or hurting. I have never once had a provider actually perform any kind of testing to determine if any part of my cognition has improved or declined with the use of these drugs.
These are powerful drugs with strong side effects and withdrawal effects. Even with just self reporting, I feel like my providers frequently brush off issues I report; as long as I'm not having severe physical side effects, they figure it's fine.
Then I had my prescribing nurse quit, and my therapist quit shortly afterwards, right before I moved to a new state and had to switch primary care providers at the same time. Of course, it can take months to go through the enrollment process, wait for medical records to get transferred, wait to find an available appointment, and so on.
This gap in coverage led me not to be able get my prescriptions filled, and thus had to deal with the fairly severe withdrawal symptoms while in the middle of dealing with a fairly stressful move. I had to take some time off work because I couldn't think straight, due to the combined withdrawal effects and stress of the move, and spend a lot of time scrambling begging various people to make appointments soon to get temporary prescription refills, before eventually just giving up and deciding to finish going through withdrawal.
Given that kind of background, of how poorly managed and frustrating to deal with drug-based therapies are, I can see the appeal to self-controlled therapies that don't rely on this complex, fragile, and overbooked network of licensed medical providers.
That said, I wouldn't try this kind of thing out on myself; one of my complaints about the drug based therapies is that they are entirely based on self-reported outcomes, and I find that lack of any kind of rigorous testing of whether they are effective or whether they are having unintended consequences in other areas of cognition quite troubling. But I can see the appeal of having something that doesn't rely on this fairly unreliable and in many cases unhelpful network of medical providers.
>This gap in coverage led me not to be able get my prescriptions filled //
I'm in the UK, on prescription with a fixed dose. When the tablets run out I'm responsible for renewal. Part of the problem with my "condition(s)" is memory troubles, my short term memory is terrible. I also have anxiety on communicating using the telephone.
The system is fine if one can manage oneself; I can't do that sufficiently.
What I don't understand is why, as the Doctor has prescribed a long-term regime of tablets and the dose is fixed, why there's no system to order my medication and then notify me. Now I realise that not re-ordering if it's not needed is an efficiency but if I've not reordered and the Doctor hasn't OK-ed it then something is going wrong in my life that medical authorities need to know to treat me: like I've been hospitalised, or I'm suffering flu-like symptoms (withdrawal) and starting to get encroaching thoughts of self-harm and suicide.
Last time I collected my medication the pharmacy (not physically connected to the doctor's clinic) told me I had to call the doctor for a in-person review. Took me a month to drum up the courage to phone them, first available appointment was 3 weeks away.
Now, I consider myself to be quite healthy, generally capable, not really that ill. There doesn't seem to be anything in place to allow this system (of review and medication acquisition) to take account of how my condition disables me from using the system. If I had severe memory loss I don't see how I'd manage at all - I presume I'd be treated differently and that I'm just falling through the gaps a little because my condition is not so severe.
TL;DR observations on impact of mental health on using UK health services.
>I find that lack of any kind of rigorous testing of whether they are effective or whether they are having unintended consequences in other areas of cognition quite troubling. //
Indeed, depression medication appears to be done on an individual trial-and-error basis. You go to the doctor and say, you think the medication is screwing you up and they give you something else to try, rinse and repeat. Seems lacking in rigour.
It seems like this would be a more viable path, as TDCS has been shown to have a negligible effect on the voltage in the brain when tested on cadavers - it doesn't penetrate.
Since the magnetic approach induces the current, it seems more likely to work.
There should be a way for these DIY-ers to share what they're doing with each other and the scientific and medical community. An application that can provide a network of support and communication would be beneficial to these neuro-adventurers (current mental and emotional state, motivations, treatment plans, etc). Self-medication is not a bad idea, but it can require proper guidance and information to be truly effective.
I mean https://www.reddit.com/r/nootropics exists. Probably very few members if any have any involvement in medicine, but there's a lot of emphasis on randomized controlled trials, meta-analyses, etc., whenever available.
Not really. More an emphasis on people with vague notions having their vague notions cemented by other over-confident under-informed people with more-cemented notions.
I'd propose modeling on the relationship between orthopedic surgeons and bodybuilders or weightlifters or perhaps athletes in general. It seems a very close analogy and has been mostly long term stable.
Tms especially has been looked into heavily by researchers as well as the military over the last 20 years. The results have been remarkable both as treatment but also as a concentration/ skill and learning booster with effects being maintained long after treatment. I believe NPR did a segment on this recently as well.
It's ironic to think that given everything we think we know about how the brain functions , such a gross and simple procedure as wiring a battery to your head or inducing a magnetic field would have such strong and even beneficial effects.
I'd guess that putting the brain and body in novel states would stimulate all kinds of effects. Do you know of any more general studies on novel states? Does the impact of the treatment (TMS) reduce over time (not persistent effects, but the effect from a single treatment)?
As to your first question I am not sure what you define as 'novel state', I am assuming you do not mean in the form of and LSD trip. But if you could clarify I could attempt to address your question.
An interesting example would be the treatment of migraines, and or focal epilepsy using TMS. Migraine treatment with TMS, is believed to set the brain in a controlled firing rhythm, whereas migraines are believed to be caused by uncoordinated neural firing similar to epilepsy but in a milder form.
> Single-session tDCS data in healthy adults (18–50) from every cognitive outcome measure reported by at least two different research groups in the literature was collected. Outcome measures were divided into 4 broad categories: executive function, language, memory, and miscellaneous. To account for the paradigmatic variability in the literature, we undertook a three-tier analysis system; each with less-stringent inclusion criteria than the prior. Standard mean difference values with 95% CIs were generated for included studies and pooled for each analysis.
> Results
> Of the 59 analyses conducted, tDCS was found to not have a significant effect on any – regardless of inclusion laxity. This includes no effect on any working memory outcome or language production task.
Evolution might be dumb (i.e., non-intelligent). But it has had millions of years to optimise an electric channel. Give that some credit. We cannot sit down with current tools to push the envelope with just decades of (mis)understanding.
So this is called Algernon's law. That evolution has probably picked all the low hanging fruit, and it would be hard to find simple things that work.
The counter example might be that we evolved to conserve energy. Now that we have basically limitless calories, some parameters set by evolution may not be optimal.
There are also things like stimulants that seem to make people better able to focus on the task they want. Evolutionary this is probably suboptimal. Doing boring work without reward is probably a waste of energy other resources, and you should go find a task that is rewarding. IIRC hunter gatherers were found have higher rates of ADHD genes. Now being able to focus on boring tasks is a requirement for success, and ADHD is a huge curse.
hmm... feels like there is something missing in this article. nice introduction and then the article ends. more like a recap of past events.
Would like to hear some summary/conclusion/insights of the in reach diy "probands".
There are things worse than people experimenting on themselves. A world where there are such stringent controls that people are caught and/or punished for doing it, or where scientists are do not continue to study and publish for fear of what a few people will do is quite obviously worse.
I am glad that there is at least an attempt here to engage and warn people. (If I were interested in doing this, I would definitely heed the warning myself!)
Having said that, we ultimately have to remember and respect the right to individual self-determination, as well as the incredible value of openness in scientific research.
While I'm not willing to do this to myself, what if these people are onto something, and their experimentation leads to something that enriches our world? (I'm not saying that it's likely, but it is possible.) It's not anyone's place to do much more than warn them, as has been done, and then to let them be.
Essentially agreeing with what you're saying, but it's important to note that there are ethics boards and regulations on medical research to prevent situations such as the data obtained by scientists during the holocaust.
A key word is informed consent. Research by its nature is conservative and small steps.
There's a whole world of bioethics out there & it's a common undergraduate major, to continue this discussion :)
There are concerns w.r.t. the scientific value of this kind of DIY experimentation though. First, there are the sample size and control problems, but more critically, the experiment is meant to change the brain of the experimenter. That's quite a bias! However, one feature of these kind of experiments is that they can push the limits past what would normally be allowed by an institutional review board...
I'm grateful there are people out there willing to push past what is "allowed" by review boards and regulatory agencies. Some of the data provided may be dubious, but if it weren't for unsafe, seat of the pants DIYers out there willing to take risks, I think we would be in a much less advanced world.
Personally, I'd chose to trade those events for whatever scientific advancements were gained. But I think you're probably referring to things besides human subjects research, which is a different story.
All of the relevant examples from that link are about experiments performed on people other than the experimenter. That is a pretty big difference from what is being discussed.
While I'm in agreement with everything you've said, I'd like to try and play devil's advocate:
You could expand this to say that not wearing a seat-belt should be made legal or that all drugs should be made legal or many other things where informed consent should be made legal. The problem is that not only many people are less responsible or intelligent than you might be, their irresponsibility can lead to harming other people. Suppose the effects of a person experimenting on themselves might cause some temporary loss of focus or control as a direct result and this would happen while they were driving or operating heavy machinery etc. There is a certain balance between personal freedom and laws that limit it, and sometimes this balance is not in favor of a minority that don't need the law, but it has to apply to all.
Again, I don't agree with the above argument - just think one should be ready for it when it is given.
A related possibility is tDCS being applied to children, in hopes to improving their performance in school. Doesn't seem too far-fetched given that articles like this are circulating:
Not wearing a seatbelt SHOULD be legal, as well as all drugs. What should not be legal is allowing your children to not wear seat belts, or allowing them to do drugs. Also, doing drubs while driving obviously endangers others.
Not wearing a seatbelt is legal in many places, or at least not enforced. And enforcing brain zapping would be even harder, because people do it in the privacy of their own homes.
But the argument isn't about legality. It's whether scientists should work with these people. They are going to brain zap anyway. The scientists have nothing to lose by collecting their data. They could also give helpful warnings and information to limit the harm.
But above all don't call them idiots for trying this. There are desperate people with serious conditions that are willing to take a small risk for anything that might help their condition. The medical system is very slow, conservative, and risk averse, in adopting new treatments. So people that want better treatments are forced to take it into their own hands. If doctors offered this treatment today, this wouldn't be an issue.
while this seems bad, remember the "medical community" gave a go ahead on sticking fluoride in the water supply which actually harms children's brain development. Then there's the whole fats fiasco that went on for decades. I think the electro stimulation is lame just as I think the arrogance of medical "science" can at times also be lame.
"A number of distinguished scientists have indulged in self-experimentation, including at least five Nobel laureates; in several cases, the prize was awarded for findings the self-experimentation made possible. Many experiments were dangerous; various people exposed themselves to pathogenic, toxic or radioactive materials. Some self-experimenters, like Jesse Lazear and Daniel Alcides Carrión, died in the course of their research."
51 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 107 ms ] threadYou generally need to see a doctor or prescribing nurse on a monthly basis in order to get a prescription. The value of this visit seems to be fairly low, however; all of the monitoring they do is purely through self reporting, so they are relying on someone going through complex mental issues to self report accurately about whether something is helping or hurting. I have never once had a provider actually perform any kind of testing to determine if any part of my cognition has improved or declined with the use of these drugs.
These are powerful drugs with strong side effects and withdrawal effects. Even with just self reporting, I feel like my providers frequently brush off issues I report; as long as I'm not having severe physical side effects, they figure it's fine.
Then I had my prescribing nurse quit, and my therapist quit shortly afterwards, right before I moved to a new state and had to switch primary care providers at the same time. Of course, it can take months to go through the enrollment process, wait for medical records to get transferred, wait to find an available appointment, and so on.
This gap in coverage led me not to be able get my prescriptions filled, and thus had to deal with the fairly severe withdrawal symptoms while in the middle of dealing with a fairly stressful move. I had to take some time off work because I couldn't think straight, due to the combined withdrawal effects and stress of the move, and spend a lot of time scrambling begging various people to make appointments soon to get temporary prescription refills, before eventually just giving up and deciding to finish going through withdrawal.
Given that kind of background, of how poorly managed and frustrating to deal with drug-based therapies are, I can see the appeal to self-controlled therapies that don't rely on this complex, fragile, and overbooked network of licensed medical providers.
That said, I wouldn't try this kind of thing out on myself; one of my complaints about the drug based therapies is that they are entirely based on self-reported outcomes, and I find that lack of any kind of rigorous testing of whether they are effective or whether they are having unintended consequences in other areas of cognition quite troubling. But I can see the appeal of having something that doesn't rely on this fairly unreliable and in many cases unhelpful network of medical providers.
I'm in the UK, on prescription with a fixed dose. When the tablets run out I'm responsible for renewal. Part of the problem with my "condition(s)" is memory troubles, my short term memory is terrible. I also have anxiety on communicating using the telephone.
The system is fine if one can manage oneself; I can't do that sufficiently.
What I don't understand is why, as the Doctor has prescribed a long-term regime of tablets and the dose is fixed, why there's no system to order my medication and then notify me. Now I realise that not re-ordering if it's not needed is an efficiency but if I've not reordered and the Doctor hasn't OK-ed it then something is going wrong in my life that medical authorities need to know to treat me: like I've been hospitalised, or I'm suffering flu-like symptoms (withdrawal) and starting to get encroaching thoughts of self-harm and suicide.
Last time I collected my medication the pharmacy (not physically connected to the doctor's clinic) told me I had to call the doctor for a in-person review. Took me a month to drum up the courage to phone them, first available appointment was 3 weeks away.
Now, I consider myself to be quite healthy, generally capable, not really that ill. There doesn't seem to be anything in place to allow this system (of review and medication acquisition) to take account of how my condition disables me from using the system. If I had severe memory loss I don't see how I'd manage at all - I presume I'd be treated differently and that I'm just falling through the gaps a little because my condition is not so severe.
TL;DR observations on impact of mental health on using UK health services.
Indeed, depression medication appears to be done on an individual trial-and-error basis. You go to the doctor and say, you think the medication is screwing you up and they give you something else to try, rinse and repeat. Seems lacking in rigour.
Moreover, and perhaps more importantly-- I have tried it plenty of times and have never experienced any negative effects.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUW7dQ92yDU (part1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_olmdAQx5s (part2)
Since the magnetic approach induces the current, it seems more likely to work.
The closest I think they can get, is to provide normal medical treatment for the complications which arise.
It's ironic to think that given everything we think we know about how the brain functions , such a gross and simple procedure as wiring a battery to your head or inducing a magnetic field would have such strong and even beneficial effects.
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=transcranial+magnetic+s...
An interesting example would be the treatment of migraines, and or focal epilepsy using TMS. Migraine treatment with TMS, is believed to set the brain in a controlled firing rhythm, whereas migraines are believed to be caused by uncoordinated neural firing similar to epilepsy but in a milder form.
Recently the FDA has approved such a treatment: http://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Newsroom/PressAnnouncements/uc...
http://www.brainstimjrnl.com/article/S1935-861X(15)00857-8/a...
> Methods
> Single-session tDCS data in healthy adults (18–50) from every cognitive outcome measure reported by at least two different research groups in the literature was collected. Outcome measures were divided into 4 broad categories: executive function, language, memory, and miscellaneous. To account for the paradigmatic variability in the literature, we undertook a three-tier analysis system; each with less-stringent inclusion criteria than the prior. Standard mean difference values with 95% CIs were generated for included studies and pooled for each analysis.
> Results
> Of the 59 analyses conducted, tDCS was found to not have a significant effect on any – regardless of inclusion laxity. This includes no effect on any working memory outcome or language production task.
Evolution might be dumb (i.e., non-intelligent). But it has had millions of years to optimise an electric channel. Give that some credit. We cannot sit down with current tools to push the envelope with just decades of (mis)understanding.
How does that fit into your theory? It seems like glasses are an improvement over nature, using very simple (by modern terms) technology.
The counter example might be that we evolved to conserve energy. Now that we have basically limitless calories, some parameters set by evolution may not be optimal.
There are also things like stimulants that seem to make people better able to focus on the task they want. Evolutionary this is probably suboptimal. Doing boring work without reward is probably a waste of energy other resources, and you should go find a task that is rewarding. IIRC hunter gatherers were found have higher rates of ADHD genes. Now being able to focus on boring tasks is a requirement for success, and ADHD is a huge curse.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recurrent_laryngeal_nerve
I am glad that there is at least an attempt here to engage and warn people. (If I were interested in doing this, I would definitely heed the warning myself!)
Having said that, we ultimately have to remember and respect the right to individual self-determination, as well as the incredible value of openness in scientific research.
While I'm not willing to do this to myself, what if these people are onto something, and their experimentation leads to something that enriches our world? (I'm not saying that it's likely, but it is possible.) It's not anyone's place to do much more than warn them, as has been done, and then to let them be.
A key word is informed consent. Research by its nature is conservative and small steps.
There's a whole world of bioethics out there & it's a common undergraduate major, to continue this discussion :)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unethical_human_experimentatio...
Personally, I'd chose to trade those events for whatever scientific advancements were gained. But I think you're probably referring to things besides human subjects research, which is a different story.
You can't determine if they're justified until you've also looked at their costs.
You could expand this to say that not wearing a seat-belt should be made legal or that all drugs should be made legal or many other things where informed consent should be made legal. The problem is that not only many people are less responsible or intelligent than you might be, their irresponsibility can lead to harming other people. Suppose the effects of a person experimenting on themselves might cause some temporary loss of focus or control as a direct result and this would happen while they were driving or operating heavy machinery etc. There is a certain balance between personal freedom and laws that limit it, and sometimes this balance is not in favor of a minority that don't need the law, but it has to apply to all.
Again, I don't agree with the above argument - just think one should be ready for it when it is given.
http://kuow.org/post/electricity-could-boost-your-kids-brain...
But the argument isn't about legality. It's whether scientists should work with these people. They are going to brain zap anyway. The scientists have nothing to lose by collecting their data. They could also give helpful warnings and information to limit the harm.
But above all don't call them idiots for trying this. There are desperate people with serious conditions that are willing to take a small risk for anything that might help their condition. The medical system is very slow, conservative, and risk averse, in adopting new treatments. So people that want better treatments are forced to take it into their own hands. If doctors offered this treatment today, this wouldn't be an issue.
The topic has appeared on HN other times, but never getting >=10 comments.
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12078895
"A number of distinguished scientists have indulged in self-experimentation, including at least five Nobel laureates; in several cases, the prize was awarded for findings the self-experimentation made possible. Many experiments were dangerous; various people exposed themselves to pathogenic, toxic or radioactive materials. Some self-experimenters, like Jesse Lazear and Daniel Alcides Carrión, died in the course of their research."