MIA Today

From The Chicago Maroon: A neuroscience student reflects on the psychiatric system’s failure to care for its patients--and how it can often make matters worse.

Researchers have calculated the dose-response benefits of ordinary hobbies, habits, and lifestyle practices that are available without any trip to a doctor or a drug store.

Therapists who encounter climate distress should reject the false burden borne by individuals and embrace a spirit of shared vulnerability, solidarity, collective action, and demands for justice.

From alice-miller.com: The renowned Swiss psychotherapist summarized the way repressed early maltreatment leads to chronic emotional disconnectivity.

We interview Renee Schuls-Jacobson about her book Psychiatrized: Waking up After a Decade of Bad Medicine which details Renee's experiences being prescribed the benzodiazepine clonazepam (Klonopin) for seven years.

Psychiatry can be used as a tool by those in power as an arbiter of normality, but it also reflects the dominant attitudes, values, and beliefs of society.

Leading researchers point out that a new antidepressant study in NEJM failed to account for withdrawal symptoms, casting doubt on the results.

From the American Psychological Association: "The APA failed in its role leading the discipline of psychology, was complicit in contributing to systemic inequities, and hurt many through racism, racial discrimination, and denigration of people of color, thereby falling short on its mission to benefit society and improve lives."

The Danish Psychiatric Association has a leaflet on its website entitled “Make Psychiatry Healthy.” I found that the suggestions would make psychiatry sicker than it already is. 

When I was emotionally stuck, I didn’t feel the current understanding of psychiatric problems and treatment would help. In fact, I felt it would be a hindrance to recovery.

The New York Times article paints a rosy picture of ECT, but it’s based on a misleading study and dismisses the plentiful research on ECT’s harms.

From Ms. Magazine: After being force-sterilized and tortured by psychiatry as a young woman, Buck fought fiercely, speaking out against both psychiatric abuse and the way medicine defines schizophrenia and psychosis.

From IIPDW: Reimbursing tapering strips that help patients taper medication will save a lot of suffering and death, yet health insurers refuse to do so.

A dramatic rise in demand for college mental health services has led to counselors feeling burned out. Counseling center directors are looking for solutions.

From The New Yorker: In Pablo de la Chica's short film "Mama," a caregiver at a chimpanzee sanctuary and the orphaned chimps she cares for—both victims of the ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo—help each other heal.

Members and supporters of Free Britney America staged their third demonstration so far this year in Washington, DC, in support of ending conservatorships.

From Psychiatric News: “There is an urgent need to develop official guidelines for how to safely taper psychotropics”—for both patients and physicians, says Mark Horowitz, MD.

An interview with Hans Skott-Myhre on the seeds of post-capitalist subjectivity to be found in the writing of Franco Basaglia and R.D. Laing.

From The Atlantic: As the 20th century progressed, the field moved away from the idea that social reforms were a necessary part of preventing disease and willingly silenced its own political voice.

Commonly used autism interventions, such as ABA, have been found to be both ineffective and abusive, inflicting trauma on those subjected to them.

New guidance on how to taper and discontinue from psychiatric drugs from leading researchers Mark Horowitz and David Taylor.

From Psychology Today: One anthropologist after another has been amazed by the degree of equality, individual autonomy, indulgent treatment of children, cooperation, and sharing in the hunter-gatherer culture that he or she studied.

From Chronic Illness Trauma Studies: The impact of one of the ACEs (adverse childhood experiences) in particular - emotional neglect - is huge and underrecognized.

A TV writer claims that research shows that Tetris is “literally a trauma first aid kit.” Her tweets sound scientific, but the research behind it is unconvincing.

Celia Brown, Ron Bassman, and Peter Stastny mourn the loss of Darby Penney, who fought to transform the mental health system in New York.