http://www.daytondailynews.com/opinion/content/opinion/daily/0710letters.html Letters

The Dayton Daily News
10.7.2005

Cruise no expert on biochemistry

So Tom Cruise thinks psychiatry is a "pseudoscience." Cruise professes a belief in Scientology and that's fine. It does not, however, render him an expert on medicine or biochemistry.

Cruise's comments to Matt Lauer on The Today Show were uninformed at best, and mostly just plain erroneous.

While it is true that psychotropic drugs are sometimes overprescribed and even abused, this is true of many medicines. Are physicians to stop prescribing all of these drugs because a small group of individuals decide to act irresponsibly with them?

Cruise claims there is "no such thing as a chemical imbalance," yet offers no evidence to back up his claim.

While it is true that there is no clear-cut test available to measure neurochemicals in the brain, there is overwhelming clinical evidence that when prescribed antidepressants, particularly those increasing serotonin uptake, the vast majority of patients experiencing depressive disorders realize moderate to complete reduction in symptoms.

If Cruise chooses not to believe in psychiatry or pharmacological therapy, that is his right. However, demeaning an entire profession (psychiatrists), as well as millions of people who have benefited from these medicines is, shall we say "glib."

Cruise may be a "top gun" in the movies, but he is a flameout intellectually.

— Cary Camron, Englewood

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