At first blush the case of Esmin Green, a Jamaican immigrant who died unattended on the floor of a Brooklyn psychiatric emergency room, is outrageous. She’d been left in a chair in a waiting-room for 24 hours before falling off that chair and dying. It hardly seems possible that a patient requiring hospitalization would have […]

The headline of this ABC News report says it all: “Ignored Psych Patient Dies on Hospital Floor.” Most people go to the hospital to get help, not to be allowed to fall on the floor and left to die … despite having security guards — and even a doctor! — notice them before walking away!Note […]

Over the last two weeks there have been a number of shooting-sprees across the US. The most recent was at Northern Illinois University. It turns out the shooter had been in treatment for a mental disorder:University Police Chief Donald Grady said Friday that Kazmierczak had become erratic in the past two weeks after he stopped […]

It’s a scandal! Of course antidepressants don’t work, and their makers know it! Now we have proof!… uh, guess again, folks … the real story here isn’t entirely what you may think it is. Here’s a sample story on this revelation (this one from the New York Times):The makers of antidepressants like Prozac and Paxil […]

I hadn’t spent more than a couple months in the world of psychiatry, before I realized that having more than one diagnosis was common. But a recent news item actually backs up this intuition with hard data:A new study discovers a majority of psychiatry outpatients have more than one disorder, and more than one-third have […]

I came across a review at Slate, the online magazine, of a book on ECT, commonly referred to as “shock therapy.” It offered a view of ECT that one rarely sees anywhere else in the media; namely that it’s a powerful treatment for mood disorders, and that the visions of it that Hollywood has conjured […]

Unfortunately, I have few answers to offer to all of the many problems I’ve cited above (in my initial series of posts which you can read, in order, at The Heart of the Matter). They’re beyond my expertise, and in most cases, are beyond anyone’s skill, at this point.My message is simple: Despite the problems, […]

So far, you may think I’m in the “anti-psychiatry” camp, but I am not. By no means! For all of the problems with psychiatry I’ve pointed out so far, I think the anti-psychiatry folks are far more dangerous to those with mental illnesses, than even the worst psychiatrists.When I talk, here, about the “anti-psychiatry movement,” […]

Rather than having three levels of treatment (routine periodic treatment in one’s doctor’s or therapist’s office, attendance at a day treatment or partial hospitalization program, and inpatient psychiatric wards), I propose that several more such levels be created. Among them:A level of outpatient clinical care, similar to partial hospitals, but perhaps a couple of hours […]

While psychiatric-ward stays have saved many lives (including mine), overall, they aren’t always the best way to deal with a depressive. Since psychiatry has become crisis-oriented, however, they’re a necessary evil. They will continue to be, until psychiatry becomes less crisis-oriented.One of the main problems with putting depressed patients into psychiatric wards, is that they’re […]