I want to comment on this, but let me start by saying that I'm not a psychiatrist and likely have many misconceptions about the field myself. What follows are merely my impressions. At the same time, this is sort of a soapbox of mine because I feel that psychiatric medications and their intended use are somewhat misunderstood. Also, I hope that this post doesn't come across as preaching or being pointed at anyone in particular as it's clear that this quote from OM's post is well-intentioned...it simply sparked this thought process in myself.

Psychiatrists and the medicine they prescribe work very well for symptom relief in cases where a set of symptoms is pervasive to someone's life. For example, symptoms of depression (sleep and/or appetite disturbance, loss of interest in once enjoyable activities, depressed mood, irritability, lack of energy, etc.) effect the whole of one's life. Research shows that, due to this fact, antidepressants combined with psychotherapy (by a psychologist, counselor, or other therapist) is the most effective treatment. Similarly, if anxiety is a problem for someone in many areas of their life, anti-anxiety medicines can help psychotherapy be more effective. The situation with a fear of blood, however, is that anxiety is only debilitating in the presence of a specific stimulus, which encompasses a relatively small portion of the average person's life.

Bottom Line: Medicine (anti-anxiety) would address a much larger problem than someone with a specific phobia actually has, especially a phobia of blood rather than bridges or open spaces. Think of taking climbing and mountaineering gear on a low elevation loop hike.

Now, earlier I spoke of "symptom relief" which points to another issue regarding psychiatry that I feel warrants discussion. Any good psychiatrist will tell you that the goal of psychiatric treatment is for a client to function independently, without medication. The reason being that mental health symptoms are usually not the problem itself. If you fall in a cold stream, would you first add insulation to your body because you're cold, or would you first get out of the cold water. The problem is that you fell into cold water, a symptom of which is being cold. Likewise, anti-anxiety medicine may relieve anxiety as a symptom but doesn't increase your ability to cope with stressors, which may be the real problem.

Bottom Line: Desensitization and other techniques that will increase coping ability have the potential to solve the problem rather than merely relieving the symptoms.