Doctoral thesis in psychology: areas of interest and possible resources/connections?

(Carolyn aka stokies) #1

As some of you know, I am currently enrolled in my doctoral program in clinical psychology. I am in the process of narrowing topics and felt this forum might be a good way to gauge interest in the variations I am contemplating immersing myself within.

If this should go elsewhere on the forum, I understand.

I am highly intrigued with anecdotal input about the relief of anxiety symptoms and other mental health issues, ranging from this all the way to major diagnoses. That is of course too wide a net, so if I go this route, I figured anxiety/depression might have the most information to delve into.

However, I am likewise fascinated with the gut microbiota’s influence on brain development, experience as well as how nutrition influences the expression of genes. Clinically, I have zero ideas how to wrangle that down into a workable population aside from a survey of clinicians and their awareness and implementation of collaborative relationships with MDs and nutritionists. Yet that still doesn’t do justice to keto specifically.

I’ve reached out to Dr G Eades and I know Carrie Brown is a curator of extensive experience in the mental health merry-go-round she dealt with in her own inspiring journey.

The other workable/manageable thought I had was correlations between food addiction, nutrient-poor foods in youth and trauma…

Thoughts? Input?

Thanks…

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #2

There is a psychiatrist in Boston, Dr. Chris Palmer, who has been studying the effect of a well-formulated ketogenic diet on schizophrenia: https://www.chrispalmermd.com/

Dr. Georgia Ede, another psychiatrist, and formerly of Smith College, has also had some experience with treating patients for mental problems: https://www.diagnosisdiet.com/

Both doctors write columns in Psychology Today.

(Carolyn aka stokies) #3

Yes Dr Edeand I exchanged pleasantries but she is not interested currently - timing and such. But I will definitely look into Palmer as well! Thanks for the suggestions :smile:

#4

Chris Palmer was on the Low Carb MD podcast a couple of weeks ago. It was a great listen. He talked about several patients he treated who have schizophrenia.

One of the things that interests me is how keto may help women and girls with ADHD binge eating disorders. Binge eating (without purging) has become a diagnostic criteria for ADHD. There’s a growing body of evidence that keto help manages ADHD and there’s certainly plenty of anecdotal evidence that it will help with binge eating issues as well.

A number of years ago Dr. Carolyn Piver Dukarm wrote a book on the connection between eating disorders and ADHD (when this was still an idea most people hadn’t thought of). She’s an MD and runs an eating disorders clinic at Sister’s of Charity in Buffalo, NY. I don’t know what she thinks about keto, though.

(Jennifer ) #5

I didn’t know this had already been posted about. So I posted about it as well up above. I have links to the article and a video interview with Metabolic Health Summit.

~K-Bombs

(Bunny) #6

I love this article written by Emily Deans, if you ever wanted to understand the ketogenic diet, this is the one to read, it is really deep!

Your Brain on Ketones:

How a high-fat diet can help the brain work better - Dr. Emily Deans M.D.

What really hit home with me in the above cited article is the GABA to Glutamate ratios as it relates to mental health in children and how a metabolically fit person goes into ketosis when they are sleeping irregardless of whether or not they are on a ketogenic diet?

What interests me the most is the state of ketosis when we are sleeping, it is almost like a hidden vestige that gets torn further from its roots (we quit going into ketosis when we are sleeping because of the content of the diet and lack of exercise?) in our industrialized world and science of refining and preserving foods to a point where it is too potent and toxic for our bodies to handle?

I think there is a limit to just how far we can refine and concentrate food with chemical manipulation and make it visually attractive to eat and continuously eat it without consequence!

Also taking into account if food was not refined and preserved for shelf life it could shorten the worlds food supply in contrast to population increase, so how do you balance that? Newer technologies and innovations to make food healthier?

Here we are in the year 2019 trying to induce ketosis while we’re awake (artificially?) to reverse metabolic dysregulation from this food we created to try and fool Mother Nature?

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #7

Unlike other Internet forums we could name, the Ketogenic Forums actually have a useful search function. Look for the magnifying glass icon at the top right of your screen, next to your user icon and the three horizontal bars.

(Carolyn aka stokies) #8

Never a wory on my end - the more the merrier :smile: Thank you!

(Carolyn aka stokies) #9

OMG - I really hoped you would find your way here, to the point I almost tagged you. But that felt… stalkerish?

Thank you SO much and I will comb through these ideas. I couldn’t agree more about GABA/glutamate in regards to mental health. That has been a huge area of personal interest and trying to decipher what exactly I can distill for this project!

(Jennifer ) #10

Thanks, @PaulL!

(Jennifer ) #11

Thank you, also, @stokiesgoneketo!
:upside_down_face: