In the News
Antipsychotics Increase Mortality in Parkinsonism
January 27, 2012
In a prospective study of 5,391 deaths among people with Parkinsonism, Canadian researchers found a significantly higher risk of death within 30 days for people who had been newly prescribed atypical antipsychotics. The risk of death was even higher for those newly prescribed typical antipsychotics.
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Legal Coercion, Recovery, and Human Rights
January 27, 2012
Mary O’Hagan, an international mental health leader with lived experience, writes on the paradox of increasing legal coercion of psychiatric patients, even as the recovery model–and respect for human rights–have become “accepted norms.”
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Antidepressants Increase Suicide Risk in Children and Adolescents
January 27, 2012
In a meta-analysis of studies of 6039 individuals, researchers in the UK determined that, consistent with previous meta-analysses, antidepressants increased “suicide-related outcomes.”
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Stress Associated With Brain Shrinkage in Healthy People
January 26, 2012
In studies of healthy people experiencing stress, Yale researchers found tissue loss in brain areas regulating emotion, self-control and other behaviors.
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Early Trauma, Social Stress Accompany Psychosis
January 26, 2012
Researchers at Emory University find that childhood trauma, sensitivity to psychosocial stress and a heightened biological response to stress are associated with the onset and severity of psychosis.
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Discontinuing Psychotropics Reduces Falls in Elderly
January 26, 2012
Australian researchers look at the literature on the effect of psychotropics on falls in the elderly; largest effect of any randomized trial was achieved by discontinuation of psychotropics.
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Recovery Stories
A Psychiatrist Remembers His Recovery from Schizophrenia
January 23, 2012
Nathaniel Lehrman, M.D.
A psychiatrist since 1949, I was psychiatrically hospitalized on December 21, 1963 at New York City’s Mt. Sinai Hospital. I stayed for three months, was diagnosed correctly as “schizophrenic reaction, paranoid type,” and recovered fully. Full Article →
From the Loony Bin To Stand-Up Comedy
January 14, 2012
Andrew Hays
I was sixteen and going on seventeen and I had never gone crazy before. I think the most startling aspect of it is how utterly unable to acknowledge it I was. Even after.
Blogs
More on Recovery & Liberation: Oppression & Resilience
Jack Carney, DSW
January 26, 2012
Just a few days ago, the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, perhaps the foremost legal advocacy organization for persons with disabilities in the country, issued its “vision of community integration” for the disabled, listing the “key principles” that should …
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Is It All in Your Head?
Sandra Steingard, M.D.
January 25, 2012
In a recent NPR story, there was a discussion of the serotonin theory of depression. It was acknowledged by the scientists who were interviewed that there is no evidence of a serotonin deficiency in the brains of people who are …
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The Taint of Eugenics In NIMH-Funded Research Today
Robert Whitaker
January 25, 2012
Recently, Thomas Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, identified the “NIMH’s Top 10 Research Advances of 2011.” He wrote: “This has been a year of exciting discoveries and scientific progress . . . Here are 10 breakthroughs …
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Tsunami of Frozen Grief Found in the Clinical Work
Elliot Goldberg, LCSW
January 24, 2012
One of the primary clinical teachings found in the pursuit of prescription drug withdrawal: we need stepping stones and a great many of them to navigate the perilous terrain. In the fight against ‘diagnosis by prescription’ one man, one woman, …
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Excellent Article on Antipsychotic Drug Harm Reduction in Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing
Will Hall
January 24, 2012
Matthew Aldridge, a psychiatric nurse at London’s Lambeth Hospital, just published a new article in the 2011 Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing, “Addressing Non-Adherence to Antipsychotic Medication: A Harm-Reduction Approach.” This is an extraordinarily well researched clinical discussion …
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Foundation for Excellence in Mental Health Care Projects
Gina Nikkel, Ph.D.
January 23, 2012
One of the incredible things I get to do is talk to researchers, people with lived experience, family members, psychiatrists, psychologists, pediatricians, therapists, social workers, public policy makers, foundation experts, philanthropists, peer specialists and others from all over the world …
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Psychiatry’s Grand Confession
Jonathan Leo, Ph.D. / Jeffrey Lacasse, Ph.D.
January 23, 2012
The psychiatry profession has finally come clean and confessed on a national media outlet that there is no evidence to support the Serotonin Theory of Depression. Today, on NPR’s Morning Edition there is a segment about the chemical imbalance theory, and …
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