Coming out of lurkdom to note that when Deb (Jing-Mei)Chen was trying to diagnose Dr. Carter with bipolar disorder, she referred to "DMS." That would be DSM IV (Title: Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders : DSM-IV. Publisher Washington, DC : American Psychiatric Association, c1994)--just nitpicking!

-- Elizabeth Flygare (aisling50@aol.com), May 12, 2000

Answers

Thank you Elizabeth! That one sailed clear over my head last night.

-- Lisa (lisayas@yahoo.com), May 12, 2000.

I wonder if that was a deliberate error on the part of the writers to show an error through Deb, or if they really messed up. Surely the medical advisors who help them write the show would have picked up on it! Or it could have been a blooper on the actress's part, and maybe they didn't want to re-film it.

-- Melanie (msintn@hotmail.com), May 12, 2000.

I picked up on that, noted it on another thread. I LOL when she said that! And LOL at Mark's comment "Now you're a psychiatrist?" Obviously not!

-- S. Trelles (trelles@ix.netcom.com), May 12, 2000.

I was laughing at that too! And she was pretty quick to judge Carter as Bi-polar, wasn't she? I took a psyhology course and my teacher explained how to use the manual, and clearly Carter could fit one of several different mental disorders categorized in the manual. There are lesser mental disorders that Carter could be suffering from, not something as severe as bi-polar disorder, type 1 or II.

-- samira (matb_west@chickmail.com), May 12, 2000.

Just want to throw in my two cents regarding Carter possibly being bipolar. (i'm no psychiatrist, just a patient of one) I'll spare you my own personal sob story, but EVERYTHING regarding his actions points to some form of bipolar. Mania- severe ANYTHING.. the singing... the anger... the aggravation... the lack of sleep... the insistence to turn down help! Depressive- the crying... not wanting to do anything etc... all within a matter of minutes. There are so many different variations.. Ten different docs could give him a different evaluation.. but it is clearly (in my humble opinion) some type of psychiatric problem. Without proper medication, someone suffering from this would most definitely appear to be on drugs to someone who didn't understand the problem... Ya he may actually be on some kind of drugs.. but many times people who have strong personalities coupled with these feelings try anything and everything to fix themselves... they find it hard to deal with mental disorders in general... a personal weakness. (such as an alcoholic trying to beat alcoholism) He could have been suffering all along.. the attack just brought it to the surface and in stereo. Yes this is just a show.. but it echoes reality. Mental disorders are soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo misunderstood.. I hope that he is in fact bipolar, and that the story line helps open the eyes of millions of ER watchers out there.

-- Paige (pg@eyecool.com), May 12, 2000.

I will spare you the long version of the rant, but welcome to the dark hole of mental health. Mental health professionals cannot treat substance abusers (ie patients self medicating) until they are not dependent upon drugs. Substance abuse professionals have little luck and very often cannot treat mentally disturbed patients who are alcoholics or substance abusers. If ER can in any way shine a light into this black hole where waaaaay to many people fall, I say skip the emmy and head to the Nobel committee. The Government still does not seem to understand the problem. Thank you for your attention.

-- Deb (KHege@AOL.com), May 13, 2000.