In other countries, symptoms of mental illness vary, with treatments that American doctors are just beginning to appreciate
By Patricia Wen
LOWELL - Heap You's doctors thought she was crazy. The Cambodian immigrant kept saying her neck was going to explode, though an examination showed nothing physically wrong. One hospital put her on antipsychotic medication.
But eventually, the mother of five was referred to Dr Devon Hinton, a psychiatrist with a clinic in this city's struggling downtown. She arrived in his office one spring day 10 years ago with her neck upright and rigid, even as she sobbed about her troubled family life. She told Hinton that she didn't want to move her neck because excessive "wind," bottled up in her body, might surge through her neck, break blood vessels, and kill her.