What Care for the Criminally Insane Can Teach Us
In this piece for The Pew Charitable Trusts, Michael Ollove reports on Oregon's model of intense care and supervision for those found guilty except for insanity.
"Oregon’s model...
You’re Not Imagining It: Empathy Hurts
From WBUR: National tragedies such as the recent school shooting in Parkland, Florida can be traumatic even for those who were not directly affected. It is...
Mad In America Film Festival In The News
Boston.com has published an article about the Mad In America Film Festival, running through this weekend in Medford, Massachusetts. "Making people rethink psychiatry —...
Mad Economy: Let’s Change the World!
Everyone in the world is either touched by their own mental health issues or have had a family member affected. What if they directed their buying power to an organization that would use the profits to fund exciting mental health & recovery projects both in the developing world and in their own countries; projects that would be ethical, non-coercive, personal recovery-based, and were aimed at creating recovery communities? What if they could buy products, crafts, services, art, music, books from people who had experienced mental health issues, enabling them to set up their own businesses or buy from social co-operatives that enabled distressed people to work and earn a living wage?
“When PTSD Is Contagious”
“Therapists and other people who help victims of trauma can become traumatized themselves.” Aaron Reuben writes in The Atlantic. “Hearing stories of suffering, in other words, can generate more suffering.”
Mental Health Industry Should Embrace Choices Beyond Drugs
In this video for NowThis, Yana Jacobs critiques the mental health industry standard of prescribing drugs as the first-line treatment for "mental illness." She emphasizes...
Hold Your Heads Together to Reduce Prejudice of Mental Health
From Openforwards: The biomedical model of mental illness does not reduce prejudice against those who are suffering from mental health concerns. Words like "illness" and...
Long-Term Social Supports Needed After Onset of Psychosis
New data on the effects of social support after early onset of psychosis suggests that patients with intense social support function better than those without such help, but than once supports are removed the effects diminish.
How Online Forums Offered ‘Lifeline’ for Sufferers
From The Times: In an age in which benzodiazepine dependence is increasingly becoming a global problem, online forums serve as a lifeline for numerous benzodiazepine...
Anyone Can Be Trained to Hallucinate
From Flipboard: In a recent study on auditory hallucinations, all participants — not just those who had been diagnosed with psychosis — experienced conditioned hallucinations. The study...
Students With Mental Health Conditions Find Support at BU
From STAT: For the past three years, Boston University has offered one of the few programs in the nation dedicated to teaching students who have...
Mental Health Patient Becomes Best Mental Health Nurse
From ABC Australia: Matthew Ball, a mental health nurse with lived experience of hearing voices, psychiatric diagnosis, and hospitalization, was recently named the Australian College...
The Social Life of Opioids
From Scientific American: Increasing prescription rates of opioid painkillers are often blamed for America's current opioid crisis. However, a growing body of research suggests that...
When the Mad Research the Mad
In this piece for Asylum Magazine, Sue Phillips, Penny Stafford, and Shirley Anne Collie discuss their involvement in a participatory action research project evaluating the...
Lack of Face-to-Face Contact Doubles Depression Risk for Older Adults
New research suggests that more frequent in-person contact lessens the risk of depression in older adults. The study, published in this month’s issue of the Journal of the American Geriatric Society, found that in Americans over fifty the more face-to-face contact they had with children, family and friends, the less likely they were to develop depressive symptoms.
Psychology in the Metacolony
From Mail & Guardian: Colonialism today is more entrenched in our society than it ever has been in the past, and traditional psychology and mental...
The Fictions and Futures of Transformative Justice
In this interview for The New Inquiry, two co-editors and three writers of Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories From Social Justice Movements discuss prison abolition and...
Family Oriented, Home-Based Treatment Best for Youth with Symptoms of Psychosis
A pathbreaking new study out of Finland suggests that early intervention programs for youth experiencing psychotic-like symptoms may see the greatest improvement when treatment works within the home rather than in a hospital setting. The research, to be published in next month’s issue of Psychiatry Research, found greater improvement in functioning, depression, and hopelessness among teens in a new need-adapted Family and Community oriented Integrative Treatment Model (FCTM) program.
Depression Discrimination More Severe in High Income Countries
According to a study published in this month’s British Journal of Psychiatry, people diagnosed with depression in high-income countries are more likely to limit...
Confusion Over Antipsychotic Dosing Data in RAISE Study
Yesterday, the New York Times reported that schizophrenia patients in an experimental treatment program (RAISE) who experienced better outcomes had been on lower doses of antipsychotics than normal. However, the article published in the American Journal of Psychiatry on Tuesday did not divulge any data on the varying antipsychotic drug doses in the different study groups.
Exercise Effective for Early Psychosis, Studies Show
A new study out of the University of Manchester found that personalized exercise programs reduced the symptoms for young people suffering from their first episode of psychosis. Researchers also conducted an accompanying qualitative analysis and found that the participants experienced improved mental health, confidence, and a sense of achievement and felt that autonomy and social support were critical to their success.
George Monbiot on the Politics of Belonging
In this video for Verso Books, author George Monbiot explains how neoliberalism has destroyed our natural capacity for altruism. He proposes that we create a...
Colleges Get Proactive in Addressing Depression on Campus
From The New York Times: The number of college students with mental health concerns is rapidly increasing, straining many universities' mental health and counseling centers. Colleges...
Trump’s Pick for Mental Health ‘Czar’ Highlights Rift
From The New York Times: President Trump's nominee to direct SAMHSA, Dr. Elinore McCance-Katz, who is a strong proponent of the medical model of psychiatry,...
Fighting For Change: An Epiphany From Inside the “Movement”
I am a person labeled with “severe and persistent mental illness,” and so I have been trying to break the cycle of oppression that comes with a label like that. At the same time, I am trying to find ways to heal and to accept things about myself that are different from others, while also seeking to raise up my brothers and sisters in this desolate and dark place. This morning, I had an epiphany upon awakening. While it's hard to put into words, it feel's vital, and I want to try and get it down.
