Psychiatrist Questions Psychiatrist

DNA testing for mental health issues?

I need a doctor who can do a DNA test for mental health.

Male | 59 years old
Medications: xanax
Conditions: anxiety

4 Answers

PsychiatristPsychiatrist
there are no DNA tests for mental health
There is no evidence, despite the hype, that mental health issues are genetically derived. For that reason, there cannot be any such test. A good assessment of your early childhood issues or any under-acknowledged trauma would explain what is bothering you. Children whose mothers put them in daycare in the first few years of life often have such issues. Even if your favorite aunt took care of you or Mother Teresa, herself, it wouldn't change things. We need our person in the first years, and when our person leaves, we think it's because of us. We have difficulty trusting and/or we develop ongoing anxiety of being left or not being enough. Similarly we could develop depression or alternating depression and anxiety. If you were raised in a family that didn't allow complaining of feelings or modeled a lack of expressing feelings of injury, that would make things worse, because you would not be encouraged to get those feelings out, which is the way we heal. If I were you I would get myself a good fat "decorator" pillow into which you can scream on behalf of the child you used to be and start emptying out your hurt, mistrust, fear, anger or rage. Buried feelings create your symptoms. You need to do it, though, on behalf of the child you were, not who you are today. You are probably suffering from a repression ethic. If you were raised in a family that blames rather than self-reflects, it's even worse. If you suffered abuse, including criticism and feeling misunderstood or had little guidance, these are all additions causes of anxiety, especially if you withheld your urge to cry.
DNA testing will provide little besides you are predisposed to a condition. A thorough clinical interview could do the same.



See this link...
https://www.idgenetix.com/
and
https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/looking-at-my-genes