A medical condition is defined as a physiologic variance from a normal range. This is why physiology is the organizing principle of the medical model.

Different physiologies respond to different treatment. Physical measurement is necessary to determine the presence and nature of a physiologic abnormality and select a medical therapy that is likely to improve it. Measuring physiology before and with medical treatment is the way to personalize therapy and achieve a favorable clinical outcome.

Unfortunately the psychiatric model remains based primarily on symptoms and behaviors. These are sorted and classified by a list of syndromes called DSM disorders. Psychiatrists use interviews, rating scales and performance measures to describe a patients behavioral syndrome and as the basis for selection of medical treatment. However, clinical experience makes obvious that there is no consistent relation between these symptoms and behaviors and response to medications. A set of symptoms and behaviors may suggest a mental disturbance, but does not specify the nature of a person's neurophysiology nor their likely response to neuro-active agents.

Lacking a measure of individual brain function in these disorders, psychiatric medication selection remains educated guessing and medication response a chance occurrence. This explains the low rates of treatment outcomes and high rates of adverse effects that are observed in psychiatry.

To improve the random nature of psychiatric therapeutics, our lab began electroencephalographic (EEG) and quantitative EEG (QEEG) research in 1986. The goal was to distinguish individual differences in brain function that could help improve medical treatment in persons with mental disorders. This innovative research generated an inclusive medical approach that draws upon homeostasis - the established organizing principle of complex physiology - and uses EEG/QEEG data to assist doctors in understanding, separating and improving brain variations which cause physical illnesses and mental disorders.

In this procedure, a prospective patient's EEG data is compared with a large, clinical outcome database of heterogeneous EEG's and their diverse medication responses. The patient's EEG data are mathematically classified and correlated with neuro-active medication(s) likely to improve their neurophysiology.

Research with EEG-linked fMRI has recently shown that the human brain is primarily a homeostatic organ and has increased interest in the automatic neurophysiology which controls these continuous, stabilizing activities. A breakthrough in neuroscience, this insight has decreased interest in "lesion behavior" research and accelerated the study of resting state brain activity. It follows that a new clinical approach is needed which is also grounded in homeostatic physiology.

The psychiatric model isn't based on these complex, instinctive interactions. A similarly oriented clinical approach is needed, one that is grounded in resting state physiology, gives priority to instinctive brain and bodily interactions and provides a safe, inexpensive technology for measuring and monitoring them. This is the way to unify human physiology and medical treatment.

My growing EEG/QEEG database includes patients with a broad range of medical diagnoses and/or DSM disorders. I enjoy collaborating with other physicians and institutions to integrate my research and approach into the practice of general internal and family medicine. Working in partnership allows us to more effectively diagnose and treat patients.