Abram Hoffer, Ph.D. M.D.

~
November 11, 1917 May 27, 2009

Three Fold Inspirational 1) Clinical Expertise 2) Academic Integrity 3) Moral Courage Humanitarian Compassion

Clinical Expertise

The Standard of Care in Psychiatry 2010

Medications treat the symptoms of mental disorders. They cannot cure the disorder, but they make people feel better so they can function.
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/mental-healthmedications/complete-index.shtml#pub3

Between 1981 and 2000, total prescriptions for all antidepressants increased by 353% from 3.2 to 14.5 million.
Hemels M, Koren G, Einarson T. Increased use of antidepressants in Canada: 1981-2000. The Annals of Pharmacotherapy. 2002; 36:1375-1379

Estimate: 1 in 10 Americans use SSRI medications

Prescribing Practices

Year: 2000 AntiDepressants USA Holland Germany 2.7% 0.5% 0.2%

Stimulants Both

4.3% 1.2% 0.7%

33.7% 8.5% 5.9%

Rebecca Riley
Age 4

Rebecca Riley
Diagnosed at age 2 ADHD Bipolar Insomnia

A medical malpractice suit filed yesterday asserts that a Tufts Medical Center psychiatrist who diagnosed the girl as bipolar when she was 28 months old and then treated her for two years with a regimen of powerful drugs is to blame for her death. The parents of 4-year-old Rebecca Riley are awaiting trial on charges that they killed her in December 2006 with an overdose of psychiatric drugs.
Shelley Murphy, Boston Globe Staff, April 4, 2008

"The care we provided was appropriate and within responsible professional standards. The appropriate care of our patients is our greatest duty. Dr. Kifuji has outstanding credentials and is respected within her field.
Tufts-New England Medical Center, standing behind their employee, Dr. Kifuji

Dr. Kifuji has stopped practicing, pending a ruling by the state medical board.

But her lawyer has said she was just practicing

mainstream psychiatry.
It's now estimated that nearly one million children (in USA) like Rebecca Riley have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, or manic depression.

The Standard of Care in Child Psychiatry circa 2004

- Valproic acid, (anti-seizure drug used off-label in children to calm aggression); - Clonidine, use for insomnia. - Seroquel for bipolar disorder (not approved for children under the age of 16) -No consideration of the role of diet, food allergies, sleep hygiene, exercise, orthomolecules, social service support for young parents;

Rebecca Riley

RIP 2002-2006

Psychiatry is more fun when the patients get well. BSW I enjoy my practice of psychiatry quite well, thank you very much!
her former psychiatrist

Initial Severity and Antidepressant Benefits: A Meta-Analysis of Data Submitted to the Food and Drug Administration.
Author Irving Kirsch Dept. of Psychology Univ. Hull, UK

Background: Meta-analyses of antidepressant medications have reported only modest benefits over placebo treatment and when unpublished trial data are included, the benefit falls below accepted criteria for clinical significance.

Drug-placebo differences in antidepressant efficacy increase as a function of baseline severity, but are relatively small even for severely depressed patients. The relationship between initial severity and antidepressant efficacy is attributable to decreased responsiveness to placebo among severely depressed patients, rather than to increased responsiveness to medications. Funding:
The Authors received no specific funding for this study.

Good news: The British National Health Service has de-listed (won't pay for) all SSRI antidepressants and has allocated the funds to train 20,000 therapists who do cognitive therapy, EMDR etc. to be made available for moderate to severe depression instead of the drugs. Wow! The basis for this decision is the PLoS article submitted to the FDA in February, showing that SSRIs are no better than placebo as far as the intended effect is concerned, while the side-effects are of course horrendous and include suicide, cancer and diabetes. Just in case you haven't seen this, Helke Ferrie (private correspondence: March 24th 2008)

The power of words

By naming things we have dominion over them Consider the varied clinical (and financial implications!) of these two terms:

nervous breakdown vs. psychotic illness

The Wisdom of the Colloquial

You are driving me crazy. I am beside myself. You push me to the breaking point.

What is a nervous breakdown?

a temporary state of incapacitation due to excessive stress coupled with inadequate coping ability.

I have heard of a man lost in the woods and dying of famine and exhaustion at the foot of a tree, whose loneliness was relieved by the grotesque visions with which, owing to bodily weakness, his diseased imagination surrounded him, and which he believed to be real.
Thoreau Walden Solitude

Dr. Abram Hoffers Adrenochrome Theory offers the best explanation of this biochemical breaking point
see
http://orthomolecular.org/library/jom/archive_list/index.shtml for numerous related publications Hoffer, Osmond, Smythies et al 1951-present

Well, you dont say!!

How to behold the patient

Destigmatize Engage Humor Relationship

Treat people like you want them to become and you help them attain that behavior.
Goethe

Dr. Hoffers therapeutic comment to patients.

I wish I had your gene pool!

Dr. Hoffers therapeutic question to patients.

What will you do when you get well?

Academic Integrity

The Adrenochrome Hypothesis: Clinical Applications

Ferrari

Jeep

Which is better?

The Two Categories of Patients in my Practice

Psychiatric High performance but better stay on road, use high octane fuel get regular maintenance!

Somatic Can stay up all night partying, over imbibe, shake it off and do it again the next night. No mechanic required.

What I tell my patients. You are not mentally ill. You are intoxicated.

Distress vs. Disease Intoxication vs. Illness Being Drunk vs. Being a Drunk

Example of a rational treatment protocol: the cast.

But it is NOT rational treatment if the patient is still in a cast 6 years later! .Well, we never know when you might break your leg again, so we surgeons decided to keep you in this cast for the rest of your life. Better to be safe than sorry!

Therapeutic Insight based upon the Adrenochrome Hypothesis: We all have a breaking point.
(effort to de-stigmatize)

The problem is correctable.

(the role of hope)

The Stories Around the Adrenochrome Hypothesis 1938 Green and Richter demonstrate that cytochrome oxidase can convert epinepherine to adrenochrome. 1951 Hoffer, Osmond, Smythies et al begin lifelong collaboration 1958 Hoffer reports presence of adrenochrome in human plasma, 1958 Szara fails to confirm Hoffers finding Julius Axelrod collaborates with Seymore Kety (Nobel prize). 1951- present Hoffers patients continue to get well and pay taxes and continues to publish papers which are ignored
See http://orthomolecular.org/library/jom/archive_list/index.shtml
for listing of JOM articles 1967-present!

New generations of orthomolecular psychiatrists carry on the politically and economically incorrect work of offering patients safe, effective, and cost-effective care.

The adrenochrome hypothesis has been a very helpful map that you and I have followed and you we know that it has been very effective in directing promising investigations and many clinical successes.
personal correspondence 2-09

"High-affinity Niacin Receptor HM74A is Decreased in the Anterior Cingulate" Brain Research Bulletin, 2008. Dr Christine Miller. "In conclusion, one important implication of the data we present here is that the early clinical studies by Abram Hoffer reported in a notable degree of success through treatment of un-medicated patients with niacin.".

Hoffer Comment: This means that there is something wrong with the receptors of niacin, the door into the neurons. This is why so much niacin has to be given to force its way in. This paper will direct attention away from drugs and to the family of vitamin B3 substances. The drought of interest in this work is at last over and we are at the beginning of a new and rational psychiatry.

Well, imagine that! It only took 57 years!!

Take Home message

When stressed past ones breaking point, (defined biochemically by the intoxicating accumulation of adrenochrome), whether from life in general or a torturer in specific, people experience predictable worsening stages of disorientation, depersonalization, and distress. In clinical settings this is termed psychosis, mania, schizophrenia and more accurately, nervous breakdown. In political settings (when being tortured), this is termed willingness to confess. In both instances, the biochemistry renders the content implausible to the point of being an unreliable version of reality, since the subject is intoxicated past his ability to speak the truth.

Moral Inspiration

Nobel Laureates Misbehavin

In 1975 at the age of 37, David Baltimore shared the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Howard Temin and Renato Dulbecco. The citation reads, "for their discoveries concerning the interaction between tumour viruses and the genetic material of the cell." At the time, Baltimore's greatest contribution to virology was his discovery of reverse transcriptase (RTase)

Baltimore is best known for his role in an affair of alleged scientific misconduct.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Baltimore

Dear Brad: I knew ____A____ (a future Nobel Laureate) very well and consider him a third rate scientist and a crook and a thief. Once I sent NIMH some adrenochrome as they did not know how to make it. I sent it to another scientist, Udenfriend, who was not on speaking terms with __A___ and when ___A___asked him for a few milligrams, he refused to give it to him, This did not deter ___A___ and he sneaked into Udenfriends lab and stole some. This was gaily announced by ___B____ (another future Nobel Laureate) at the meeting I attended and he thought it was a hilarious. He did his best to destroy our hypothesis by showing that it was impossible for any adrenochrome to be made except maybe a slight amount by the salivary glands. He shared his Nobel because NIMH placed great pressure on the Nobel Committee in Sweden, NIMH desperately need a winner and he was their choice even though third rate. I heard a few years ago that NIMH was very fearful that Osmond and I would get the Nobel and they decided to destroy us. Abram (Hoffer, personal correspondence 4-1-08)

I am convinced, as an old hand at this game, that schizophrenia is not a unique disease, that it is caused by many biochemical abnormalities and the real answers, if we ever get them, will lie in nutritional treatment. I have never seen a single patient on drugs ever get well even though they are helped and their symptoms are not as troublesome . The drugs are all palliative, never curative. There is recent evidence from Johns Hopkins that in schizophrenia brains at autopsy there is a defect in the structure of their niacin receptors and this will explain why many of them need so much to get into the neurons in their heads. This paper was submitted for publication by a very dedicated research worker from this university. But the companies will not touch this as there is no patent on vitamins and they want a drug which they patent and earn billions, not a cheap simple vitamin than anyone can sell and which does not kill any one. Abram Hoffer 3-08 Personal Correspondence

Why are we here tonight? Why do we not abide by the standard of care?

Imagine it is the year: 1951

Dont take for granted your supportive colleagues.

Congratulations to YOU for being here tonight

If I wanted to be popular, I wouldnt be doing research.

Abram Hoffer, Ph.D. M.D.
Perished while publishing, treating and teaching! Glorious legacy lives on.