The psychotropic drug and the pharmaceutical device at the origin of the new paradigm of modern psychiatry

Abstract

According to the idea of “paradigms” in psychiatry, formulated by psychiatrist G. Lantéri-Laura we propose the thesis of the current “paradigm” of psychiatry, which predominates in the nosology, the clinics, the epidemiology, the theory and the treatments of the psychological field. Following the thesis and the presentation of Lantéri-Laura of the first three paradigms he identifies, we formulate, by hypothesis, the existence of a “fourth paradigm”, which is a result of the appearance of the first psychotropic drug, of psychopharmacology and of what we call the “pharmaceutical apparatus.” This overhaul will produce new types of “disorders”: “pharmaco-modified disorders” and “pharmaco-derived disorders” or “new syndromes”. The “pharmaceutical apparatus” and the breach opened by the socio-economical changes

will also redesign and allow the emergence of new forms of psychotherapy and a new rationality inspired by the management of risks. The incidence of evidence-based medicine on psychotherapy and the rise in the last twenty years of empirically supported therapy (mainly cognitive behavior therapies) will result in the entry of a school of psychotherapeutic thought that belongs to the “fourth paradigm”.