Around The Web

Psychiatrist Sharon Packer writes of the role that psychiatrists can play in making differential diagnoses, and a case of 'schizophrenia' reassessed in the emergency...

The Telegraph provides a forum for Joanna Moncrieff: "The use of antidepressants continues its inexorable rise. Since the early 1990s the number of prescriptions...

The British Psychological Society's "Understanding Psychosis and Schizophrenia" report is criticized in two successive articles by Editor in Chief Emeritus Ronald Pies of Psychiatric Times.

Benedict Carey at the New York Times covers the push for new programs that emphasize supportive services, therapy, school and work assistance, and family education, rather than simply drug treatment.

The official voice of the American Psychiatric Association covers the short and long term side-effects of antipsychotics and promotes the use of therapeutic alternatives...

Pharmalot, Pharmalittle: “US Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf appeared in a federal database of payments made last year by drug makers...

In this opinion piece for STAT, Carrie Arnold wades into the ethical debate over forced treatment in a case that "has set off a firestorm...

From The New York Times: Learning Shakespeare can be a valuable way for veterans to begin to understand and heal from the trauma of war. Article →­

In this piece written in honor of World Mental Health Day, Peter Kinderman emphasizes the importance of challenging the biomedical model of mental health and paying...

Subtitled "Pain is an emotion," Scientific American's portrait of Dennis Rogers, whose uncanny feats of strength seem predicated on his anomalous relationship to pain...

From Medical Xpress: People from all marginalized backgrounds are subjected to microaggressions and hostility every day, which has serious physical and mental health consequences. But our...

1BoringOldMan notes the distance traveled from Robert Spitzer's Research Diagnostic Criteria (RDC) to Thomas Insel's Research Domain Criteria (RDoC), concluding "we have a faulty...

From NPR: "A Center for Public Integrity and NPR investigation found drug companies have infiltrated nearly every part of the process that determines how their drugs will be covered...

In Mind the Brain on PLOS Blogs, James Coyne reviews some high-profile speakers' claims about the science of positive psychology, and examines more closely whether simply thinking positive thoughts or doing small, good things for yourself can significantly improve overall health, well-being and happiness.

-The pharmaceutical industry spent $4.53 billion on direct-to-consumer advertising in the US in 2014, up 18% from $3.83 billion in 2013.

-When we "re-narrate" our own stories and identities, it may be an opportunity for either liberation or re-oppression.

Matthew Cooper, writing for Newsweek, reports that despite the preponderance of political rhetoric about “mental illness” after mass shootings, a review of the research suggests that the connection between mental health and gun violence is dubious.

NPR interviews Dr. Lance Dodes, author of The Sober Truth: Debunking the Bad Science Behind Twelve-Step Programs and the Rehab Industry. Despite the fact...

The New York Times reports that a growing number of infants and toddlers are being prescribed dangerous psychiatric drugs. “Almost 20,000 prescriptions for risperidone (commonly known as Risperdal), quetiapine (Seroquel) and other antipsychotic medications were written in 2014 for children 2 and younger, a 50 percent jump from 13,000 just one year before.”

From Open Excellence/Surviving Race: Surviving Race will convene advocates, artists, educators, peer supporters, psychiatric survivors, and white allies in response to the increased visibility of structural racism, systemic oppression, and police violence.

From Aeon: "Our basic needs never change. The need to be seen and appreciated...to belong. The need for nearness and care, and for a little love! This is given only through slowness in human relations." ~ Norwegian philosopher Guttorm Fløistad

From CounterPunch: Somehow a population with DDT, Love Canal, the Dalkon Shield Intrauterine Device, asbestos, Three Mile Island, and Agent Orange under its belt is mustering up the same old psychological defenses it used to not learn from those debacles.

From Sustainable Human: When we are alienated from our gut feelings, we no longer have a sense of reality, nor a sense of truth.

In the Atlantic, Todd Rose explains that the concept of the “Average person” is actually a relatively new idea in history. The invention of...

William A. Wilson presents shocking evidence that a lot of published research is false and that science’s self-correcting mechanisms are broken. “There is no...