Over-diagnosis

Direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing has an “alarmingly high” 40% false-positive rate.

A new article explores how psychiatric diagnoses are differentially applied to people of different racial and class backgrounds.

Attempting to locate the mechanisms of psychiatric disorder is a step in the wrong direction and fails to challenge potentially unjust social practices.

Researchers examine how rapid discontinuation can mimic the relapse of mental health symptoms and confound psychiatric drug studies.

In contemporary U.S. culture, people who intentionally hurt their bodies are called “insane.” We may starve ourselves or carve ourselves, taking to the extreme culturally-embedded norms like thinness in an effort to fight against marginalization or cope with internalized shame. But instead of obtaining the voice or place in society we yearn for, we are further ostracized.

A new article, just published online in the journal Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties, presents research suggesting that the diagnosis of ADHD is philosophically inadequate.

Researchers explore efforts to integrate educational psychology and child psychiatry.

Derek Summerfield, consultant psychiatrist at South London and Maudsley National Health Service Foundation Trust, challenges the assumption that Western depression is a universal condition.

The results of the prospective cohort study that analyzed data from almost 3,400 individuals show that individuals who experience long-term poverty perform worse on cognitive tasks than their peers who have never experienced poverty.

Lack of “right care” causes physical, psychological and financial harm to patients

I used to think that the counseling center would help me to resolve my inner conflicts. That visiting the center would do some good for me. I have since realized that most mainstream “mental health” is more damaging than helpful. These days if student counselors see any problem with a student visiting the center, they send him or her to see a psychiatrist.

Large, centralized, digital social networks and data-gathering platforms have come to dominate our economy and our culture. In the domain of mental health, huge pools of data are being used to train algorithms to identify signs of mental illness. I call this practice surveillance psychiatry.

The case of “Beth” depicts, almost innocently, the trials and tribulations of a well-adjusted, talented 15-year-old who developed depression, paranoia, panic attacks, and self-injurious and homicidal behavior, and “bipolar disorder” after being prescribed antidepressants, and then antipsychotics. After Beth decided - on her own - to discontinue psychotropic medications in favor of hormone therapy, she remained free of psychiatric symptoms.

Two new articles find that rates of ADHD diagnosis and stimulant prescription continue to rise all over the world.

Family medicine and pediatric providers are less confident in their assessment of irritability in youth than psychiatric providers, which may lead to overdiagnosis of bipolar disorder.

New data interpreted to suggest a hierarchical, dimensional system of mental disorders will aid future research efforts and improve mental health care.

For the last three years, I have been working with people, labeled "hoarders," who have become overwhelmed by their possessions in their homes. This has been some of the most interesting, challenging and thought-provoking work I have ever done. It is also an area that, I think, highlights all of the issues that challenge us in helping people who feel overwhelmed, for whatever reason.

A new article examines the usefulness of the ADHD diagnosis and suggests alternatives

Researcher Dr. Silke Schwarz highlights how Western psychology’s construction of individual resilience deflects emphasized individual pathology and deflects efforts at structural change.

Criticisms of the DSM-5 spark alternative proposals and calls to reform diagnostic systems in the mental health field.

Increasing the minimum wage - even modestly - can lead to less cases of child abuse in the home.

Seniors are twice as likely to receive psychotropic prescriptions than younger adults but are much less likely to receive mental health care from psychiatrists or to receive psychotherapy, according to a recent study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. "Our findings suggest that psychotropic medication use is widespread among older adults in outpatient care, at a far higher rate than among younger patients," the study’s lead author Dr. Maust said in a press release. “In many cases, especially for milder depression and anxiety, the safer treatment for older adults who are already taking multiple medications for other conditions might be more therapy-oriented, but very few older adults receive this sort of care."

A literature review published in BMC Public Health by researchers from Portugal and the Czech Republic summarizes results from 101 studies investigating the effect...

New research questions whether the diagnosis of ADHD even meets the criteria for a disorder, as set out in the manuals used by the medical and psychiatric fields.

Black college women endorse more perceived stress and depressive symptoms than White college women, highlighting the impacts of racism.