Understanding Panic Attacks

How does our body and mind create a system that amplifies our anxiety so rapidly? The answer to this question is complicated. Yet one answer is that a panic attack has two components: mental anguish and physical duress that play off of one another in a fast forward positive feedback loop. Once upon a time we thought of the rapid breathing and quick heart rate as physiologic symptoms or consequences of the mental anguish associated with a panic attack. We now know that these two components, the mental and physiologic feed off of one another. Anxiety leads to rapid breathing, which in turn increases anxiety. This results in still more rapid breathing and heart rate, and so on. The good news concerning this feedback loop is that it is possible to intervene by attacking either the anxiety component or physiologic component - or both.

The options available for treatment will be discussed in a future blog. They include breathing exercises and techniques, cognitive behavioral therapy, dealing with underlying conflicts and anxieties, as well as pharmacological intervention. Most of these treatments take into account the physiology that we have discussed as central to the treatment. Both the rapid time course, as well as the connection between mind and body is important concepts in understanding and treating panic disorder.