Around The Web

From Stuff: More than 800 New Zealand mental health patients were held in seclusion at some point last year, representing a six percent increase in...

From The Guardian: The British government has ordered an investigation into the growing problem of addiction to prescription drugs such as opioids, benzodiazepines, and antidepressants. Article...

From BuzzFeed: As part of a new network called the Psychological Science Accelerator, more than 400 psychologists worldwide are teaming up to fix the so-called replication...

From Truthdig: Last week marked 40 years since Franco Basaglia’s revolutionary work in Trieste, Italy, led to the groundbreaking Legge 180 (Law 180, also known...

From The Lown Institute: "For twenty years, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality maintained a digital archive of medical guidelines as a resource for...

From NPR: "...researchers have conducted an experiment that convinced some of the general practice doctors who prescribe Seroquel most frequently to cut back. All the...

From The Daily Mail: Abilify MyCite, which contains a tracker so doctors can check if it's been taken, isn't being used because it could add to patients' paranoia, an expert has warned.

-A discussion of some of the links that have been found between neurotoxins polluting the environment and higher risks of developing autistic symptoms.

Former president of Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR), Roy Eidelson discusses efforts to undermine the Hoffman report which revealed the American Psychologica Association’s collusion in torture. "First, from a familiar playbook, we have the obligatory attack on the patriotism of Hoffman and those who have criticized psychologists’ participation in abusive detention and interrogation operations,” he writes. “The most outrageous example comes from two retired military officers, David Bolgiano and John Taylor. In a recent piece they described the Hoffman Report as a ‘classic attack of cowards’ and also stated, ‘By the publication and release of this report, the APA becomes a willing co-conspirator to the likes of al Qaeda and ISIS.’”

From The National: Dr. Ewen Cameron's horrific CIA-funded experiments at a Canadian psychiatric hospital in the 1950s and '60s informed brutal torture techniques now used around the world.

From RT: The framing of an increasing array of social issues in mental health terms raises important questions about how we are being asked to think about the problems that face us.

From Dr. Joanne Cacciatore: A few very persistent scholars have finally succeeding in declaring that extended expressions of grief indicate 'mental illness' — a move that offends many.

From Red Flag: A society that normalizes the dynamics of coercive control in most aspects of life is ill-equipped to eradicate them from our personal lives.

The Center for Public Integrity reports that two scientific journals known for their industry ties have become go-to publications for researchers who minimize risks...

From The Guardian: The field of psychology is fraught with fundamental problems in its research practices, from publication bias to data corruption. The field must...

From From Insults to Respect: It is commonly assumed that antidepressants increase the risk of suicide in children and young adults, but not in adults...

In this essay for the Psychiatric Times, Dr. Edward Khantzian reflects on the pain and grief caused by all forms of racism and bigotry, from...

From The British Psychological Society: A recent study has broken new ground by asking clients to provide detailed feedback on a second-by-second basis of their experience of...

From The New Republic: "Health authorities and medical researchers widely consider medication-assisted treatment (MAT) with methadone or Suboxone the most effective way of treating opioid...

From Medical Xpress: "Traditional teachings have to come back [for us] to know who we are and how to balance ourselves...the mind, the body and the soul [have to] reconnect."

-Forbes reports on the "boom" in psychiatric drug research that is going on, after a short period where onlookers were claiming that pharmaceutical companies were leaving the business.

From Yale School of Medicine: The goal is not necessarily to get rid of the voices, said the project's co-director, but to empower voice-hearers with the skills to influence those experiences.

On Saturday morning, Susan Inman, writing for HuffPost Canada, published “What You’re not Hearing About the Hearing Voices Movement.” In it, she criticizes HVM for “failing to differentiate between the needs of people who actually have psychotic disorders and those who don't.” On Sunday the Bay Area Hearing Voices Network published an open letter in response, writing: “Ms. Inman has profoundly mischaracterized hearing voices networks (HVNs) and also demonstrates a troubling lack of understanding of the empirical literature on psychosis, optimal psychosocial intervention and recovery.”

The Guardian reports growing concerns from the Buddhist Society conference: “Jon Kabat-Zinn, who created the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine at the University of Massachusetts medical school, warned last week that some people feared a ‘sort of superficial ‘McMindfulness’ is taking over, which ignores the ethical foundations of the meditative practices and traditions from which mindfulness has emerged, and divorces it from its profoundly transformative potential.’”

From Stuff: Officials are interpreting the growing number of pills dispensed over the past decade as a sign more people are getting "support."