Is it reliable to test neurotransmitters with instruments?

  Many psychiatry departments in private hospitals are now doing neurotransmitter testing, using a device that can detect the level of central neurotransmitters to diagnose mental illness and guide medication. Similar devices are also used to treat mental illnesses based on the test results.  Many families ask us if this test and treatment is reliable. I would like to analyze the following points: 1. The mainstream psychiatric hospitals in China, i.e., above the provincial level, do not have this test and treatment method.  2, so far, the main domestic psychiatric professional journals, are not related to the report. A new drug or a new examination and treatment method, before entering clinical application, a large number of clinical studies must be done to determine the reliability and safety of the drug, test or treatment method, and these studies have to be published in professional journals. Xin Gao, Department of General Psychiatry, Tianjin An Ding Hospital 3. In recent years, psychiatric professionals have been actively searching for and exploring objective evidence of mental illness, i.e., a diagnosis of mental illness can be determined by a certain objective method, such as blood sampling and laboratory tests, CT examinations or even a certain instrument, but there has been no important breakthrough so far.  4, according to the existing medical level and physical detection means, it is almost impossible to detect the content of neurotransmitters in the brain from outside the body with instruments.  5. Taking a step back, none of the above reasoning is correct. In fact, this instrument is the one that can detect and interfere with the central neurotransmitter content for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. We would be willing to do a validation clinical study with hospitals that have this instrument to do a controlled study of the results of neurotransmitter testing and clinical consistency in patients with definite diagnoses of schizophrenia and depression (the two most predominant disorders in mental illness), during the onset and after remission, and in patients and normal people.  If the concordance is really high and statistically significant. That would be a boon to patients and their families, and we could publish this study in a professional journal for research, application and dissemination on a larger scale.