Mad in America

This is the first large-scale annual conference hosted by the International Institute for Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal. It brings together experts from across the world to discuss the practical details of withdrawal, alternatives to medication, and how to change the narratives surrounding psychiatric drugs.

Who is this conference for?

Anyone with a personal or professional interest is welcome at this conference, including those who are on or coming off psychiatric drugs, friends and family members, psychological therapists and other professional supporters, clinicians and prescribers. Although the conference talks will cover topics like research and clinical practice, all the talks will be accessible to a general audience.

At the end of the conference, there will be an opportunity for those who wish to connect with a small group of other attendees in a Zoom-based conversation. We support connections and conversations across these diverse groups.

Speakers:

Carina Häkansson is the founder and leader of Family Care Foundation for more than 25 years. With a PhD in psychology she is a licensed psychotherapist, lecturer and writer. Carina is a co-founder of IIPDW.

Robert Whitaker is the author of four books, and co-author of a fifth, three of which tell of the history of psychiatry. In 2010, his Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness won the U.S. Investigative Reporters and Editors book award for best investigative journalism. Prior to writing books, he worked as a science reporter at the Albany Times Union newspaper in New York. He is the founder of madinamerica.com, a website that features research news and blogs by an international group of writers interested in “rethinking psychiatry.”

Laura Delano met the mental health system when she was thirteen, spent fourteen years as its patient, and left it behind in 2010, when she realized that psychiatric diagnoses and drugs were not her answer. In 2018 she founded the Inner Compass Initiative and The Withdrawal Project, and is at work on her memoir Unshrunk.

Joanna Moncrieff is a Professor of Critical and Social Psychiatry at University College London, and works as a consultant psychiatrist in the NHS in London. She researchers and writes about the over-use and misrepresentation of psychiatric drugs and about the history, politics and philosophy of psychiatry more generally. She is currently leading UK government-funded research on reducing and discontinuing antipsychotic drug treatment (the RADAR study), and collaborating on a study to support antidepressant discontinuation. In the 1990s she co-founded the Critical Psychiatry Network to link up with other, like-minded psychiatrists. She is author of numerous papers and her books include A Straight Talking Introduction to Psychiatric Drugs Second edition (PCCS Books), published in September 2020, as well as The Bitterest Pills: The Troubling Story of Antipsychotic Drugs (2013) and The Myth of the Chemical Cure (2009) (Palgrave Macmillan). Her website is https://joannamoncrieff.com/ and her Twitter handle is @joannamoncrieff

Magnus Hald is a psychiatrist, and for over a decade the Director of the Division of Mental Health and Substance Abuse, University Hospital of North Norway. He has long been interested in the development of a network-oriented perspective on mental health, based on ideas that have come from his working with “reflecting teams” and “reflective processes.” For the past few years, he has been engaged in developing a medication-free unit within the University Hospital, which opened in January 2017.

Booking & Access Info:

We are able to support those with lived experience of psychiatric drugs who are unable to afford a conference ticket. If you'd like to be considered for a pre-paid ticket please get in touch. We're grateful to Open Excellence for their support for these tickets.

If you'll be attending the conference with a group, get in touch about our group discount.

If there's anything we can do to support you to attend the conference or if you have questions about accessibility, don't hesitate to contact us.

To get in touch, email us at [email protected]

Refund policy: you can refund your ticket up to 24 hours before the event. However, Eventbrite reserves the right to keep their booking fee.