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Dr. Abboud Assaf, one of the most notable psychiatrists in Lebanon, said in his website that:

Common Misconceptions: Psychiatric Disorders are incurable

Are psychiatric disorders (e.g. depression) curable?

George Chalhoub
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    I didn't see a definition of "curable" on that site. The dictionary definition isn't exactly what I thought it would be: it's, "(of a disease or condition) able to be cured. "most skin cancers are completely curable" synonyms: remediable, treatable, medicable, operable, responsive to treatment "most skin cancers are curable"" ... and **cure** is defined as, "relieve (a person or animal) of the symptoms of a disease or condition" – ChrisW May 08 '15 at 09:41
  • I thought this was the definition of treatment, in other words cure means you end the mental illness. – George Chalhoub May 08 '15 at 09:45
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    Well, mere "treatment" doesn't necessarily have any effect at all. IMO medication can relieve (i.e. end) symptoms of mental illness e.g. psychosis. Maybe for some people that (ending) is enough, they can then recover from the experience or situation and wean off the medication and remain symptom-free, i.e. the medication is only for emergency/as-needed use if the symptoms ever return. Other people might need to have a permanent prescription, to stay symptom-free ... but even "permanently symptom free, with medication" might (and perhaps should) count as a cure. – ChrisW May 08 '15 at 09:56
  • The above is not-a-referenced-answer and should maybe be deleted if we stop discussing "what is the question asking?" – ChrisW May 08 '15 at 09:58
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    I think the question would be improved if it would focus on a specific disorder like depression. – Christian May 08 '15 at 10:40
  • and even then, depression can take many forms. Some induced by a lingering chemical imbalance in the brain, some by environmental factors, some by a combination. – jwenting May 10 '15 at 08:10

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Yes, some psychiatric disorders are curable.

I was chatting to a research psychologist once about treatability of mental disorders. She told me specific phobias are easily treated with a high success rate with a single session with a therapist.

Here is one example study that looked at arachnophobes, and agrees that a single session with a therapist is effective.

The proportion of clinically significant improved patients at follow-up was 80% in the therapist-directed group

For completeness, yes, "specific phobia" is recognised by the DSM, so it can be safely considered a mental/psychiatric disorder.

Unreferenced Aside: I was very surprised, and asked if phobias are so easy to treat, why are there people still suffering from them? Apparently, people convince themselves that, while they have a phobia, they aren't suffering from it, and don't seek treatment. I offer no evidence of this; it is an appeal to an unnamed authority, but I found it interesting, nonetheless.

DJClayworth
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Oddthinking
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  • The fact that there are psychologists out there you can treat a phobia in an single session doesn't mean that every psychologist can. If you end up with a Freudian psychologist you might end up speaking about traumatic experiences for months without the phobia being solved. – Christian May 08 '15 at 11:32
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    @Christian: I'm not sure of your point. That some people can't cure it doesn't mean it is incurable. (Side note: Does anyone describe themselves as a Freudian psychologist?) – Oddthinking May 08 '15 at 13:09
  • I think this all is missing a proper definition of "curable". Basically if we e.g. are talking about phobias, then it is still there, just driven down to a level that doesn't differ much from everyone else, but you can bet your bottom dollar that there are possible situations out there that can make it resurface. – PlasmaHH May 08 '15 at 13:47
  • @PlasmaHH: Do you have any references to support your model? – Oddthinking May 08 '15 at 13:57
  • @Oddthinking: Nothing written, but I extensively talked about it with a psychiatrist (who happens to be training other psychiatrist as a successor of Peseschkian, if you know that guy) – PlasmaHH May 08 '15 at 14:03
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    @PlasmaHH if a person can overcome the phobia to the extent it no longer interferes with their life, then its cured. they may still have the fear, in the back of their mind like you said, but the actual disorder is that the fear is causing an over response, if you can control this to the point there no longer is an over-response its no longer a disorder. Fear is not a disorder. – Himarm May 08 '15 at 14:36
  • In all fairness, many people (including in mental health) would agree that "X is in DSM" is merely a synonym of "X can be billed by a mental health professional against insurance", not "X is a certified mental disorder". As a random example I'm aware of, most kinks are covered by DSM (and so was homosexuality at some point in history, if memory serves me right). – user5341 May 08 '15 at 18:25
  • Having said that, the claim is entirely too broad to be meaningful IMHO. A "mental disorder" can include chemical-imbalance-caused thing, or a psychological trauma. Clearly, the answers would be somewhat different on the two. – user5341 May 08 '15 at 18:27
  • @DVK: I used in the DSM as the best proxy I could think of to show it was accepted as a mental disorder. Any better suggestions? – Oddthinking May 09 '15 at 00:16
  • @DVK: As to the question, someone said "This falsehood about mental disorders is a popularly believed." and the OP asked "Is it a falsehood?" where I would have asked "Is it popularly believed?"! – Oddthinking May 09 '15 at 00:17
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    @Oddthinking - nothing better unless the question gets meaningfully clarified, sorry. – user5341 May 09 '15 at 00:17
  • @Oddthinking - re: meta question about quotes: one more reason to split my answer into 2 is that it's VERY likely that people will agree with one and disagree with the other (which, if i read your question correctly, would be your own view). I don't want people downvoting the trivia one merely because they disagree with the non-trivia one (or vice versa). – user5341 May 09 '15 at 01:16
  • @Oddthinking : My comment was an answer to the "Unreferenced Aside". – Christian May 10 '15 at 20:54
  • @Christian: Oh! I see. It is another reason people might not go for treatment. Good call. – Oddthinking May 10 '15 at 23:17
  • @DVK: Lost me. Is this about this question? – Oddthinking May 10 '15 at 23:18
  • @Oddthinking - no, about [meta answer](http://meta.skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/3192/should-we-limit-quote-questions) you deleted as "duplicate". Since i couldn't ping you on the deleted one and you didn't have comments to ping on non-deleted one, spammed here, sorry. – user5341 May 10 '15 at 23:20
  • @DVK: Let's go to [chat](http://chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/21567194#21567194). – Oddthinking May 11 '15 at 00:29