Anthony, in aspect to this, do you know of any sort of brain mapping type testing comparing PTSD and non-PTSD to see how PTSD effects the brain?
Sorry I missed this. There have been oodles of brain mapping comparison studies over the decades, all of which to date have equally been disproven by opposites occurring within PTSD sufferers.
PTSD has many theories, but nobody to date can factually ascertain what PTSD exactly is, where it begins, what specifically in our brain or body causes it. Neuroscience does not have this knowledge. There are lots of claims from random studies, professors, psychiatrists, psychologists, small scale studies and such, none of which proves anything. Typically the same studies have counters to the findings, which disproves any finding from the get go. Either those who have disproved something don't have PTSD, or the study is really just a complete failure and found nothing concrete.
Don't get me wrong, all knowledge is wonderful. More the merry. Something learnt today may lead towards a better idea to study tomorrow, which does find a solution, or helps a further study / idea find the solution. You just can't take any of the results as factual though and apply them to every PTSD sufferer.
For example,
Dead Link Removed, but certainly not conclusive as a standalone study, nor have I read the study itself versus this second hand news piece:
A new study by researchers from the Department of Psychology at Uppsala University and Clinical Neuroscience at Karolinska Institutet shows that people with PTSD have an imbalance between two neurochemical signalling systems of the brain, serotonin and substance P. Professors Mats Fredrikson and Tomas Furmark led the study using a so-called PET scanner to measure the relationship between these systems.
The study, which has been published in the scientific journal Molecular Psychiatry, shows that it is the imbalance between the two signalling systems which determines the severity of the symptoms suffered by the individual rather than the degree of change in a single system. Others have previously speculated that the biological basis of psychiatric disorders such as PTSD includes a shift in the balance between different signalling systems in the brain but none has yet proved it. The results of the study are a great leap forward in our understanding of PTSD. It will contribute new knowledge which can be used to design improved treatments for traumatised individuals.
I think the article, or authors of the study, probably also used the wrong wording with "imbalance" as no "balance" has yet been proven with any neurochemical system to determine an imbalance. They should have used "difference" or such wording to denote the point, being a measurable aspect is available to show symptom severity. It doesn't diagnose PTSD, but if diagnosed, apparently shows symptom severity. That is a huge find if further studied to be accurate, as an example.
Another
study claims to be able to diagnose PTSD as 95% accurate;
"Your brain is a dynamic network," said Georgopoulos, describing how healthy brains form neural networks, and then wipe the slate clean and start all over.
"So when you have, let's say, a visual stimulus come in to your eyes, then the visual network that receives that information becomes temporarily locked. That individual system lasts for a few seconds. And then very quickly, [the network] becomes again ready to absorb new information."
That's how nine of out of 10 people process their experiences, be they mundane or horrific. One out of 10, however, don't wipe the slate clean. Dreadful sights and sounds resonate in their heads.
Georgopoulos' lab can spot PTSD sufferers by magnetically scanning their brains, a procedure called magnetoencephalography.
Magnetoencephalography (MEG) is not new, and was more a matter of time until someone discovered some way to use it to find something useful instead of trying to compare brain images, which have only turned up indifferences.
