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European Journal of Public Health, Vol. 25, Supplement 3, 2015
Measurment of psychiatric disorders: The Rdoc approach Jutta Lindert J Lindert University of Emden, Emden, Germany; Brandeis University, Waltham, United States Contact:
[email protected]
Over the past several decades, an increasingly comprehensive body of research in neuroscience, and behavioral science has transformed our understanding of how the brain produces adaptive behavior, and the ways in which normal functioning becomes disrupted in various forms of mental disorders. Currently, research and diagnosis in mental disorders is based on clinical observation and patients’ phenomenological symptom reports. This system, implemented with the innovative Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-III (DSM-III) in 1980 and refined in the current DSM-V, has served well to improve diagnostic reliability in both clinical practice and research. The diagnostic categories represented in the DSM-V and the International Classification of Diseases-10 (ICD-10) remain the contemporary consensus standard for how mental disorders are diagnosed and treated, and are formally implemented in insurance billing. However, the current diagnostic systems are not informed by recent breakthroughs in neuroscience. The purpose of this talk is to describe the Research Domain Criteria Project (RDoC) in order to acquaint the Public Health experts with its nature and direction, and to facilitate commentary from Public Health experts. In a narrative review the main innovations of the RDoc approach will be described such as: 1.) Rdoc conceives mental disorders as dimension system spanning the range from normal to abnormal; 2.) it is agnostic about current disorder categories, and 3.) uses several different units of analysis in defining constructs for study (e.g., behavior, and self-reports of symptoms). RDoC, might be a useful research framework guide classification of patients for research studies, not as an immediately useful clinical tool. It will be discussed how creating such a framework that interfaces directly with neuroscience, and behavioral science, will contribute to advances in research in neuropsychiatric epidemiology and facilitate new interventions and treatments.
