Physiological Methods of Stress Management - Drug Therapies(emotion Focused)

Drugs that are used to treat anxiety that is a sonsequence of sress. They do this by slowing down the activity of the central nervous system. How is this achieved?
* GABA is a neurotransmitter that is the body's natural form of anxiety relief. GABA has a natural quietening effect on many of the neurons in the brain by indirectly making it harder for them to be stimulateed by other neaurotransmitters, slowing down their activity and making the person feel more relaxed.
* BZs enhance the action of GABA, making neurons in the brain even more resistant to exciitation and making the person feel much calmer.

Beta-blockers are drugs that reduce the activity of adrenaline and noradrenaline which are part of the sympathomedullary response to stress. Thus BBs can prevent some of the CV problems associated with chronic levels of stress. How do they do this?
* BBs reduce the activity of adrenaline and noradrenaline by binding to receptors on the cells of the heart and other parts of the body that are usually stimulated suring arousal.
* By blocking these receptors, it is harder to stimulate these cells, so the heart beats slower and with less force, blood pressure falls, and so on. As a result, the person feels calmer and less anxious.

A drug treatment that contains no active ingreadient or theraputic procedure

Abnormal physical or psychological reactions to the abrupt discontinuation of a drug to which an individual had developed physical dependence.

Conducted an experiment where a group of patients were given a drug and another group given a placebo. This enabled them to see if the success of a drug in reducing symptoms was attributable to its pharmacological properties or to something psychological. They followed 250 patietns for eight wks. BZs were significantly superior at reducing anxiety compared to placebo.

Conducted a meta-analysis and found that BZs were more effective than any other drugs for reducing anxiety.

Strengths
1. Effectiveness, as illustrated by the research evidence above.
2. Ease of use - Drugstreatment require little effort from the patient compared to significant investment in time and motivation required in the physiological methods discussed on the previous page.

Weaknesses
1. Addiction - Patients exhibit withdrawal symptoms when they stop taking BZs, indicating a psychological dependence, hence use of BZs is recommende to be limited to just 4 wks.
2. Side effects - For Bzs, these include increased aggressivenss and imparement for memory. Some studies have linked BBs to an increased risk of developing developmental diabetes.
3. Treating the symptoms rather than the problem - Effectiveness of the drug treatments for stress and anxiety only lasts as long as the person takes the drug because the problem itself has not been addressed.