The Anxiety Disease : New Hope for the Millions Who Suffer from Anxiety

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Summary: Excellent introductory book about anxiety
Review: An excellent book about panic attacks which approaches the disease from a biological perspective. Sheehan covers the seven progressive stages of the disease, causes, treatment and recovery, using case histories as examples. The book also contains an anxiety scale to help you determine whether the level of your anxiety is excessive.

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Summary: Great medical information as well as personally encouraging
Review: Excellent writing, lists, charts & more help this book remain not only interesting but also easy to read & informative from the first chapter to the last. Sheehan helps those who suffer from all forms of anxiety & panic disorders as well as those who live with them, to understand the biological basis of their disease & to find ways to obtain relief. Far from a stale medical book, The Anxiety Disease not only contains excellent background information but also symptom lists, information about medications & their side affects, suggestions about treatment & encouragement for each step of the process. First recommended to me by a Psychiatrist friend, I now recommend it myself & use this book in on-line workshop groups for those with anxiety & phobias under the auspices of the The Life Challenges Empowerment Action Project (LEAP)

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Summary: Excellent book
Review: I've had this book for 13 years and never attempted to read it until now. I thought alot of my symptoms were unique to me because I never heard of anyone else having them until I read this book. I like the way the author describes all of the steps anxiety goes through. It has helped me to recognize things I went through before I realized I had a problem with anxiety. I really feel much better about myself and believe that I do have a chance to get over my problems with anxiety.

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Summary: Omissions and Narrow Viewpoint
Review: This book has some excellent information which can be found in other less biased books. Since the author is a doctor, I'd expect him to have the viewpoint he does. However, unlike other authors on the topic, he is completely negligent in his presentation. He completely overstresses the biological component of anxiety and the necessity of medication, calling the psychological viewpoint outdated.

As both a long-time sufferer of severe anxiety and depression, and a psychology student, I can attest to the fact that anxiety is not caused just by one source of stress in life. His stages of the development of agoraphobia are correct. I lived through it.

However, I also lived through the recovery he describes in the last chapters. And I did it WITHOUT medication. He says recovery is possible without medication, and yet the person will still be vulnerable to relapsing if any major stressors re-appear. The protagonist in the book (there are actual characters-a real 'love' story, undoubtedly used as a technique to draw readers and believers to his simplistic answer). The woman, at the end of the book, tries only ONE medication which magically works for her.

This scenario is highly, highly unrealistic. Most people struggle with trying various medications. Whether this is a function of the disease or not, it is the typical occurrence from what I have both witnessed personally and through research. Additionally, the woman in the book might not just forget to take her medication (as she does in one section and suffers a relapse), but she might also require higher and higher doses in order to keep herself completely biologically armored from any further anxiety attacks.

This book presents a really cute story. Unfortunately, this is rarely the way it happens. He completely neglects the behavioral aspects of anxiety disorders, such as need for control. He also ignores the fact that many people have mixed anxiety-depression, and that depression isn't always a result of the anxiety limiting them, but that it can be a precursor to anxiety.

Also, some names of medications are omitted and incorrect, unless these are publishing errors. For instance, he mentions Alprazolam as a new drug, which it isn't, and also talks about its anti-depressant qualities. Well, Alprazolam is a benzodiazepine. It is NOT an antidepressant. Next, he mentions the trade names of all the benzodiazepines except for Diazepam, which we know as Valium.

While the names of drugs might be innocent omissions, his simplistic presentation of anxiety is NOT without extreme bias and favoritism for medicine. Is there a biological component to anxiety? Of course there is. As long as we are alive, there is a biological component to everything. But this does not mean that medication is REQUIRED to correct it. Anxiety isn't diabetes. It won't kill you if you don't take Prozac. Medication is a temporary relief, not a lifetime solution. The only real solution is learning that anxiety will not kill you. This doctor seems aimed to convince you otherwise.

You don't have to believe me, after all the author is the one with the medical degree. But I know my experience was completely different than what he has presented when it comes to treatment, and since I am human and there are others like me, I would assume I am not alone. I write the above as a warning to those who are new to this field and are looking for basic insight into their anxiety problems. You want to heal biologically? Look at your diet, exercise, vitamins, the basics! Don't go running to the doctor for nothing, wasting months trying medications with side effects more devastating than the anxiety itself.

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Summary: Phenomenal For Panic Attack Victims and Those Who Love Them!
Review: This book is the most phenomenal writing on panic & anxiety disorder that I have read...and I have read almost all of them. Before being diagnosed with panic disorder I was in absolute turmoil. Every book, article & pamphlet that I had picked up only ever told of the MOST COMMON symptoms of the disorder, leaving me feeling alone and helpless. My symptoms went far beyond the most commonly observed ones. I had no idea what was wrong with me. I literally thought that I was going crazy! It wasn't until after one more exhausting day living with the fear that I would never be the same again that I stumbled upon Dr. Sheehan's book at the University of South Florida's campus library. Despite the fact that my eyes seemed as if they were completely dialated and my hands and feet were shaking uncontrollably I could not put this book down. This was the first time in my several months of suffering that I finally thought that I was going to be ok. Dr. Sheehan had simply told accounts of other people's bouts with panic in detail. It was these stories that made me realize that I was not alone. There were other people in the world going through the same thing as me. It was because of the information in this book that I decided to contact Dr. Sheehan to see if he could help me too. To my complete amazement I found that he was working in the clinical psychology department at the University of South Florida. He has been my doctor ever since. His many years of study involving panic and anxiety disorders has left him with an incredibly vast knowledge of the subject. I would reccomend it to anyone suffering from panic and anxiety disorder as well as anyone else who would like a broader understanding of this debilitating disease that is affecting more and more people everyday. At the risk of sounding overly dramatic I would like to conclude in saying that this book literally saved my life.

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Summary: The beginning of the end of fear
Review: This book was the first step in changing my life and ending anxiety's control over it. This book should be read by those *who feel they suffer alone; *who feel they have a personality flaw that causes their anxiety; *who discourage themselves because they mistakenly believe that their anixety can be overcome by 'pulling themselves together' like 'other people do'; *are afraid to take medicines for anxiety

Sheehan's book breaks the taboo that 'its all in your mind', but rather demonstrates how the "anxiety disease" has a biological base and thus can be treated ... completely managed by proper medication.

Though dated (many new medicines have come to the market since Sheehan's book), this book explains to the lay person the new paradigm of modern psychopharmacology. (It should be required reading for every psychiatrist!)

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Summary: Very dated but not irrelevant.
Review: This book was written before Prozac and its many imitators (Paxil, Zoloft, Celexa, Wellbutrin, Remeron, Effexor, etc.) revolutionized the treatment of anxiety and depression in the 1990s. Nevertheless, Sheehan's text is of interest on at least two counts: its analysis of the relationship between anxiety and depression; its survey of the drugs--primarily MAO inhibitors and tricyclics--that preceded the SSRIs and more recent drugs. Moreover, most studies suggest that while the widely prescribed drugs of today are "safer," they are no more effective than their predecessors. In fact, in some cases the earlier drugs may be superior. Nonetheless, most readers will probably prefer a comprehensive, up-to-date text to this one.