Psychotherapy is Less Effective and Less Accessible for Those in Poverty
A special issue explores the connection between poverty, mental health, and psychotherapy.
This Is Your Personality Test Result On Capitalism
Personality tests function for an employer, intentionally or otherwise, much like diagnostic criteria function for the mental-health system: these labels determine who gets resources that capitalism itself makes scarce â not only basic necessities like food, clothing and shelter, which require money to obtain, but empathy, understanding and support, which are kept in short supply.
ISPS Australia’s Response to Schizophrenia Awareness Week: Drop the Label!
It really is time to drop the label of schizophrenia, and ISPS Australia invites us to consider just that, in favour of understanding human experience and removing the impediments to a person making sense of their experience â impediments that exist due to the primarily biomedical perspectives that continue to dominate the mental health systems.
Towards the Re-politicization of âMental Illnessâ
In the models of other social movements, I implore us to advance a multifaceted, structural, cultural, and political analysis of mental illness in America, to illuminate the reality and mechanisms of sanism, and to then envision and implement ways of organizing American life around it that do not limit our potential for flourishing so drastically.
Questioning the Integrity of Psychiatry
The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists claimed that âthe prescription of antidepressant or antipsychotic medications is something that a psychiatrist only ever does in partnership with the patient and after due consideration of the risks and benefits.â How could a responsible professional body make an assertion so patently wrong?
UN Meeting on Human Rights in Mental Health: A Response
On May 14 and 15, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights held a meeting on human rights in mental health. The event represented tensions in the United Nations between the promotion of mental health and the promotion of the human rights of people with psychosocial disabilities under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Researchers Advocate for More Robust Informed Consent in Psychotherapy
Paper outlines recommendations for more thorough informed consent process in psychotherapy, which authors proclaim is an âethical imperative."
Therapists Collaborate with Clients through Metatherapeutic Communication
Researchers develop an initial framework for understanding metatherapeutic communication practices that may inform future integration of collaboration in psychotherapy.
ECT Shock Treatment Class Action â Case Update April 2018
In March, 2018, the Court issued an Order denying class certification in the case filed against the manufacturers of ECT shock devices. Attorneys for the ECT victims strongly disagree with the Court's assessment, and have now petitioned the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for permission to appeal the ruling denying class certification.
âPsychiatric Meds Saved Your Life,â and Mine
It's not about whether it's right or wrong, true or false that psychiatric drugs save lives. It's about telling the stories that aren't being told. That's why psychiatric drugs saved my life after they destroyed my health and nearly killed me. They gave me something I care about and am passionate about writing about. They gave me a pathway to bring healing to others.
Book Review: The Other Mrs. Smith by Bonnie Burstow
In The Other Mrs. Smith, Dr. Burstow chose to use the fiction format, presumably because she felt it was the best way for readers to understand what it is like to experience electroshock and deal with the aftermath of massive memory loss. In this she succeeds spectacularly.
Scientists Fight Against the Myth of the Normal or Optimal Brain
A new study out of Yale University uses evolutionary biology to debunk the idea that there is a ânormalâ or âoptimalâ brain.
âHow Long a Timeâ: Ten Cold Hard Truths For Ending Psychiatric Abuse
Here are the Ten Cold Hard Truths we must ALL confront in our organizing efforts. If we fail to understand and grasp these truths we will ALL be susceptible to âburnoutâ and/or a slide into dead-end reformist type strategies that will only derail our efforts to reach the day when we can truly end all forms of psychiatric abuse.
The Concerned Parents’ Project: 31 Questions
The Concerned Parentsâ Project grew out of the idea that there may be parents out there who are confused and bewildered by the mixed messages on what it is to have normal and healthy childhood experiences. We posted a new question and answer for parents each day in March.
10 Things I Learned in 5 Years Consulting With People Coming Off Psych Drugs
It's been over 5 years since I started offering non-medical consultations to people in the process of coming off or hoping to come off psych drugs. I wanted to share here some things I have learned in this process. Despite how far we have come, we have a long way to go in the quest to liberate all who wish to be liberated from psychiatry.
Psychiatry by Jenny
Sighted through your pinhole spectacles: the mystery of consciousness; the timid eccentricity of suffering.
Do Antidepressants Work? A People’s Review of the Evidence
After a meta-analysis of RCTs of antidepressants was published in Lancet, psychiatry stated that it proved that "antidepressants" work. However, effectiveness studies of real-world patients reveal the opposite: the medications increase the likelihood that patients will become chronically depressed, and disabled by the disorder.
Researchers Challenge Industry-Friendly Depression Guideline
Review of a new mixed depression guideline reveals financial bias of guideline developers and lack of evidence supporting recommendations for prescribing of antipsychotics.
Should We Screen for Adverse Childhood Experiences?
One author outlines the foundations of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) research, addressing its dimensions, limitations, and potential future directions.
Psychosocial Adversities Should be Included in Diagnosis
Proposal to include psychosocial adversities that impact mental health in ICD and DSM diagnoses.
Study Examines the Difficulty of Withdrawing from Antidepressant Drugs
Correcting unnecessary long-term antidepressant use is difficult and met with apprehension by providers and service-users.
Police Violence Victims at Increased Risk of Psychotic Symptoms
Researchers examine links between police victimization and psychotic symptoms in a topical new study.
Psychiatry: The Brain is a Malignant Tumor!
We have persistently failed in trying to influence psychiatry with scientific argument because we view the brain as normal and they think it is a cancer. Imagine how weird it must seem to them: We are talking about an organ inside our heads that we treasure, and they are peering at it the way a surgeon studies a neuroblastoma.
Review Reinforces Social Connection as Protective Health Factor
Is a lack of social connection in the US harmful to health? In a review of social connection and health literature, researcher calls for a societal shift in values towards interdependence.
Duration of Untreated Psychosis Revisited: Response to the Goff Paper
Based on the studies cited, it seems hard to support the assertion that âearly initiation of antipsychotics may improve long-term course of the illness.â This raises an urgent question about initial treatment. Doesnât it make sense to try to capture all of those individuals who might get through a psychosis without drugs?