Mental Health Retrosight Perspectives

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Mental Health Retrosight Perspectives CHILDREN AND FAMILIES The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit institution that helps improve policy and EDUCATION AND THE ARTS decisionmaking through research and analysis. ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT HEALTH AND HEALTH CARE This electronic document was made available from www.rand.org as a public INFRASTRUCTURE AND service of the RAND Corporation. TRANSPORTATION INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS LAW AND BUSINESS NATIONAL SECURITY Skip all front matter: Jump to Page 16 POPULATION AND AGING PUBLIC SAFETY SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Support RAND TERRORISM AND Browse Reports & Bookstore HOMELAND SECURITY Make a charitable contribution For More Information Visit RAND at www.rand.org Explore RAND Europe View document details Limited Electronic Distribution Rights This document and trademark(s) contained herein are protected by law as indicated in a notice appearing later in this work. This electronic representation of RAND intellectual property is provided for non-commercial use only. Unauthorized posting of RAND electronic documents to a non-RAND Web site is prohibited. RAND electronic documents are protected under copyright law. Permission is required from RAND to reproduce, or reuse in another form, any of our research documents for commercial use. For information on reprint and linking permissions, please see RAND Permissions. This report is part of the RAND Corporation research report series. RAND reports present research findings and objective analysis that address the challenges facing the public and private sectors. All RAND reports undergo rigorous peer review to ensure high standards for research quality and objectivity. EUROPE Mental Health Retrosight Perspectives Alexandra Pollitt, Stephanie Diepeveen, Susan Guthrie, Marcela Horvitz-Lennon, Molly Morgan Jones, Siobhán Ní Chonaill, Dana Schultz, Harold Alan Pincus, Jonathan Grant, Steven Wooding EUROPE Mental Health Retrosight Perspectives Alexandra Pollitt, Stephanie Diepeveen, Susan Guthrie, Marcela Horvitz-Lennon, Molly Morgan Jones, Siobhán Ní Chonaill, Dana Schultz, Harold Alan Pincus, Jonathan Grant, Steven Wooding Prepared for the Alliance of Mental Health Research Funders The project described in this report was supported in Canada by the Graham Boeckh Foundation, Alberta Innovates Health Solutions, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research; in the UK by the National Institute for Health Research; and in the USA by the National Institute of Mental Health. RAND Europe is an independent, not-for-profit policy research organisation that aims to improve policy and decisionmaking for the public interest though research and analysis. RAND’s publications do not necessarily reflect the opinions of its research clients and sponsors. R® is a registered trademark © Copyright 2013 RAND Corporation Permission is given to duplicate this document for personal use only, as long as it is unaltered and complete. Copies may not be duplicated for commercial pur- poses. Unauthorized posting of RAND documents to a non-RAND website is prohibited. RAND documents are protected under copyright law. For informa- tion on reprint and linking permissions, please visit the RAND permissions page (www.rand.org/publications/permissions.html). RAND OFFICES SANTA MONICA, CA • WASHINGTON, DC PITTSBURGH, PA • NEW ORLEANS, LA • JACKSON, MS • BOSTON, MA DOHA, QA • CAMBRIDGE, UK • BRUSSELS, BE www.rand.org • www.rand.org/randeurope Preface Mental Health Retrosight was a three-year international project that aimed to investigate the translation and payback from mental health and neuroscience research, with a particular focus on schizophrenia. It looked at the development of research over a 20-year period in Canada, the USA and the UK. The project was supported in Canada by the Graham Boeckh Foundation, Alberta Innovates – Health Solutions, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research; in the UK by the National Institute for Health Research; and in the USA by the National Institute of Mental Health. It was the first project funded through the Alliance of Mental Health Research Funders, a joint initiative between the Graham Boeckh Foundation and RAND Europe. The network was established as a ‘think tank without borders’ that would undertake research and analysis into mental health research funding. This report presents the full set of backward-tracing perspectives. This is intended to complement the other reports associated with this study, which describe the findings and policy provocations, the methods and methodology, and the forward-tracing case studies. RAND Europe is an independent not-for-profit policy research organisation that aims to improve policy and decision making in the public interest, through research and analysis. RAND Europe’s clients include European governments, institutions, NGOs and firms with a need for rigorous, independent, multidisciplinary analysis. This memo has been subject to RAND’s quality assurance process, but as an interim report on work in progress has not undergone full peer review. For more information about RAND Europe or this document, please contact: Alexandra Pollitt RAND Europe Westbrook Centre Milton Road Cambridge CB4 1YG United Kingdom Tel. +44 (1223) 353 329 [email protected] i Contents Preface .......................................................................................................................... i Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................... v CHAPTER 1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER 2 Supported employment .......................................................................... 3 CHAPTER 3 Cognitive behavioural therapy .............................................................. 39 CHAPTER 4 Early intervention for schizophrenia ..................................................... 59 CHAPTER 5 Clozapine.............................................................................................. 95 CHAPTER 6 Addressing the metabolic side effects of second-generation antipsychotics ..................................................................................... 127 CHAPTER 7 Cognitive-enhancing drugs ................................................................. 165 iii Acknowledgements We would like to acknowledge all the researchers and practitioners who were willing to act as the participants for this study, particularly those interviewed for the backward-tracing perspectives. The study would clearly have been impossible without them. We would also like to thank our quality assurance reviewers, Saba Hinrichs and Sarah Ball, who provided thoughtful, constructive and timely comments. v CHAPTER 1 Introduction This report presents the story of the development of six interventions aimed at improving mental health care. These narratives were assembled as part of Mental Health Retrosight, an international project which examined the attributes of research that lead to successful translation into patient benefit. We identified the six interventions through a combination of a survey, a comparison of clinical guidelines over time and across the three countries of the study (Canada, the UK and the US) and the input of our subject expert advisors. Having selected the interventions, we then tried to develop narratives for each through a combination of telephone and face-to-face interviews, reviews of archived material and literature reviews. As we developed these, it became clear that the scope of the subjects covered and the contested nature of the fields meant it was not feasible to construct a single, definitive narrative for each intervention. Instead we concentrated on consulting a variety of sources and establishing a balanced perspective. This is why we choose to refer to these narratives as ‘perspectives’ rather than histories or case studies, as they represent one perspective on the developments, albeit one drawn from a reasonably wide variety of diverse sources. The six interventions we examined were: The use of cognitive behavioural therapy, a form of psychosocial or ‘talking’ therapy, as a treatment for schizophrenia. The recognition of the value of early intervention in schizophrenia and the realisation that treatment was often delayed. The use of supported employment as a way to help people with schizophrenia gain and maintain employment. The development, introduction, removal and re-introduction of clozapine, the first of the second generation anti-psychotic drugs. The recognition of, and moves to address, the metabolic side effects of second generation antipsychotics. The recognition of the role of cognitive deficits in schizophrenia, and efforts to develop cognitive-enhancing drugs to address them. The analysis was iterative and took a narrative approach. A researcher who had not been involved in assembling the perspectives read and reviewed the full set, extracting and 1 Mental Health Retrosight RAND Europe describing the attributes that appeared to have either promoted or hindered translation. Further details of the selection and construction of the narratives are provided in the Methods and Methodology Report.1 We are publishing the perspectives to increase the transparency of our research process. We hope the publication will allow other researchers to build on our work, through adding further cases or refining existing ones. During the project we refined and developed the methods and structuring of the cases, learning from some cases in conducting others. However, it
Recommended publications
  • ECT Citizen Petition
    Citizen Petition Submitted August 24, 2016 Petitioners Atze Akkerman, Evelyn Scogin, Dianna Loper Posthauer, Kenneth Fleischman and Tony Buonfiglio, hereby submit this Citizen Petition under 21 U.S.C. §§ 360e(b) and 360f(a) and 21 C.F.R. § 10.30, to request that the Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (“Commissioner”) either promulgate a final regulation making electroconvulsive therapy (“ECT”) devices banned devices or maintain the Class III classification of the devices and issue a final order establishing the effective date for premarket approval (PMA) for all ECT devices. Petitioner Atze Akkerman was given a round of 10 shock therapy treatments in 2003. He experienced dramatic memory loss and amnesia for his historical memory, including all memories of his children, his parents and his wife. Although he was a professional musician and toured with the Navy Band, he lost his ability to play music. He continues to suffer substantial long term memory loss and short term memory loss making learning new matters difficult. He remains on full disability following his ECT. The details of his injuries were submitted to the FDA through detailed Comment and submission of his attorney in FDA-2010-N-0585 and FDA 2014-N-1210. Mr. Akkerman also submitted a report to the MAUDE database. Mr. Akkerman is resident of California. Petitioner Evelyn Scogin is a resident of Texas who has suffered personal injury by way of persistent and continuing memory loss and cognitive damages from the receipt of ECT in 2005. She experienced dramatic memory loss, wiping out, for example, knowledge of friends and family.
    [Show full text]
  • Postpsychiatry's Challenge to the Chemical Treatment of Mental Distress
    DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN Postpsychiatry's Challenge to the Chemical Treatment of Mental Distress When we name you a ‘schizophrenic’, we take away your speech and your ability to name yourself, we The reduction of peoples distressing life experiences obliterate you. The moral position that we must adopt is into a diagnosis of schizophrenia means that they are one in which we bear witness and resistance. To bear condemned to lives dulled by drugs and blighted by stigma and offered no opportunity to make sense of witness means accepting the reality of lives harmed and damaged by many things, including psychiatry. We can their experiences. no longer deny this. Jacqui Dillon Chair of the UK Hearing Voices Network P. Bracken and P. Thomas Postpsychiatry It is open to question whether schizophrenic patients, with their lack of insight into their illness and their cognitive deficiencies, are able to assess their own situation and to evaluate and describe their psychic state and the positive/negative effects of the medication given to them. E. B. Larsen & Jes Gerlach Former Chair of Psykiatrifonden Olga Runciman Master’s Thesis Academic advisor: Morten Nissen Submitted: 11/08/13 Postpsychiatry | Olga Runciman Number of pages 79.9 Number of letters 191772 TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract ....................................................................................................................... 3 Introduction ................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • OVERCROWDING on the SHIP of FOOLS: HEALTH CARE REFORM, PSYCHIATRY, and the UNCERTAIN FUTURE of NORMALITY Johnathan Fish, J.D., LL.M.*
    11 HOUS.J.HEALTH L. & POL’Y 181–266 181 Copyright © 2011 Johnathan Fish Houston Journal of Health Law & Policy ISSN 1534-7907 OVERCROWDING ON THE SHIP OF FOOLS: HEALTH CARE REFORM, PSYCHIATRY, AND THE UNCERTAIN FUTURE OF NORMALITY Johnathan Fish, J.D., LL.M.* I. INTRODUCTION Unbeknownst to most Americans, the Wall Street bailout and the health care overhaul that were signed into law in 2008 and 2010, respectively, marked a bold new direction in federal mental health policy. Parity requirements in the bailout law eliminated much of the disparity between mental and physical health care coverage in employer-sponsored health insurance plans.1 The health care reform law signaled an even more significant shift. In a few years, the federal government will require most Americans to have health insurance coverage that must include a minimum basic mental health and substance abuse benefit.2 Along with insurance market reforms, subsidies, and a dramatic expansion of the Medicaid program, this mandate is expected to expand access to affordable mental health services and treatments for an additional thirty-two million * I owe a deep debt of gratitude to William J. Winslade for his guidance and support. This Article would not exist were it not for my wife’s extraordinary patience. 1 See Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-343, §§ 511–12, 122 Stat. 3765, 3881–93 (2008) (amending 26 U.S.C. § 9812, 29 U.S.C. § 1185a, and 42 U.S.C. § 300gg-5). 2 See Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Pub.
    [Show full text]
  • FDA Is Studying the Risk of Electroshock Devices
    F.D.A. Is Studying the Risk of Electroshock Devices - NYTimes.com 1/24/11 2:36 PM Reprints This copy is for your personal, noncommercial use only. You can order presentation-ready copies for distribution to your colleagues, clients or customers here or use the "Reprints" tool that appears next to any article. Visit www.nytreprints.com for samples and additional information. Order a reprint of this article now. January 23, 2011 F.D.A. Is Studying the Risk of Electroshock Devices By DUFF WILSON Federal regulators are weighing whether to downgrade the risk classification of electroshock devices, reinforcing what many psychiatrists consider a deepening acceptance of electroshock in modern therapy. The procedure has had a resurgence in recent years. And an estimated 100,000 Americans — two-thirds of them women — undergo the treatment for major depression and other illnesses each year. Patients, anesthetized, receive a jolt of electricity from electrodes for several seconds, inducing a brain seizure and convulsions of up to a minute. The American Psychiatric Association and other leading specialists are recommending that the Food and Drug Administration downgrade the devices to a medium-risk category from high risk, a move that will be reviewed by an agency advisory panel in Gaithersburg, Md., this week. To some extent, the review has renewed the debate over electroshock. In 1990, F.D.A. staff proposed declaring the devices safe for major depression, but never took final action amid an uproar by opponents. If the F.D.A. downgrades the devices to a medium-risk category, the equipment could be promoted and sold without new testing.
    [Show full text]
  • A Book Review
    Journal of Scientific Exploration, Vol. 24, No. 3, pp. 523-526, 2010 BOOK REVIEWS Opinion vs. Opinion A Review of: Doctoring the mind: Is our current treatment of mental illness really any good? By Richard P. Bentall New York University, 2009 There are in fact two things, science and opinion; the former begets knowledge, the latter ignorance. Hippocrates Today everyone knows someone who is ‘mentally ill,’ ‘possessed,’ ‘disturbed,’ ‘unhinged,’ or just plain ‘crazy.’ While past generations have been more open to all of these expressions, we have been taught to think only in terms of the first. Working hand in hand, the psychiatric and psychopharmacology establishments have indoctrinated us into the belief that any odd behaviour or unpleasant feeling is due to an illness of either neurobiological or genetic origin. A natural corollary is that drugs are the cure. Doctoring the Mind by Richard Bentall, a professor of clinical psychology at the University of Manchester challenges this belief. After a cursory review of the history of psychiatry with a British slant, he systematically puts under scrutiny psychiatric diagnosis à la Kraeplin and then the DSM, psychiatric theories of genetic and brain factors, and psychiatric drugs. Pointing out methodological problems, statistical manipulations and faulty assumptions, he concludes that “the dominant paradigm in psychiatry, which assumes that mental illnesses are genetically influenced brain diseases, has been a spectacular failure.”(264, emphasis added) “Conventional psychiatry,” he declares, “has been profoundly unscientific and at the same time unsuccessful at helping some of the most distressed and vulnerable people in society.” (vx) His conclusion is convincing as it follows from a critique of psychiatry that appears to be based on a good knowledge of science and the proper interpretation of research results.
    [Show full text]
  • Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) Testimony by Daniel B. Fisher, MD, Phd Jan
    599 Canal Street, Lawrence, MA 0184 Phone: 800 POWER2U www.power2u.org - Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) Testimony by Daniel B. Fisher, MD, PhD Jan. 27, 2011 Document ID: FDA-2010-N-0585-0001: Neurological Devices Panel of the Medical Devices Advisory Committee Thank you for the opportunity to share my views on ECT with you today. I base my testimony on my thirty years of practice as a board-certified psychiatrist, my five years of postdoctoral neurochemical research at NIMH, and my 19 years as director of the National Empowerment Center, a federally-funded technical assistance center. I am appalled that ECT has never been required to validate its efficacy or its safety before the FDA. I was heartened to hear that in 2008 the FDA did require such verification. However, today I am dismayed to learn that the manufacturers want the status of their devices downgraded from Class III to Class II, or the same classification as a wheelchair. In my expert opinion and that of a recent review of the ECT literature by Drs. John Read and Richard Bentall (Read and Bentall, 2010), the short-term gains of ECT do not justify its associated brain damage, memory loss, cognitive deficits and increased risk of death. I therefore recommend: 1. That ECT devices continue to be designated as class III devices and 2. That, in keeping with the approval process of a Class III medical device, their use be suspended unless and until their manufacturers can produce independently obtained evidence with government oversight of meaningful long-term efficacy and minimal short- and long-term risks of memory loss, cognitive deficits, brain damage, and mortality to warrant the resumption of its use.
    [Show full text]
  • The Bitterest Pills Also by Joanna Moncrieff the MYTH of the CHEMICAL CURE
    The Bitterest Pills Also by Joanna Moncrieff THE MYTH OF THE CHEMICAL CURE DE-MEDICALISING MISERY (co-editor) A STRAIGHT TALKING INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHIATRIC DRUGS Praise for The Myth of the Chemical Cure: ‘A revolutionary book written with the calm assurance of someone who knows her subject matter – and the people involved – extremely well. Essential reading for anyone interested in mental health’. Dorothy Rowe, www.dorothyrowe.com.au ‘This is a book that should change psychiatry forever’. Mental Health ‘This book is critically important and should be essential reading for all psy- chiatrists, politicians, service providers, and user groups. Why? Because Joanna Moncrieff’s central tenet is right, and the implications for service delivery are profound. The book is closely argued and well referenced. Even if you disagree with some of it’s overall premises, it is not legitimate to dismiss it. I urge you to read it if only as a prompt to a critical evaluation of the status quo, never a bad thing, and almost always an illuminating exercise’. Sarah Yates, Cambridge, UK ‘This is a sober and thoughtful book. I found it very engaging and worth the effort to be better informed about a subject that affects many of our clients and impinges on our professional lives as therapists’. Existential Analysis (Society for Existential Analysis) ‘...Joanna Moncrieff, a practising psychiatrist and academic, has produced a devastating critique of the use of psychiatric drugs... This courageous book has the potential to revolutionise psychiatric practice and the care of people with many forms of mental distress. Many in the therapy professions will, I am sure, celebrate its message’.
    [Show full text]
  • Schizophrenia Under Siege: the Unmaking of a Disease
    BOOK REVIEWS Schizophrenia Under Siege: The Unmaking of a Disease Pamela J. Birrell, PhD A Review of MODELS OF MADNESS: PSYCHOLOGICAL, SOCIAL, AND BIOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO SCHIZOPHRENIA. John Read, Loren R. Mosher and Richard P. Bentall (Eds.). Brunner- Routledge, Publishers, 2004, 373 pages. The year is 1961. A man waves a gun on the streets of downtown Phoenix, convinced that the CIA has finally surrounded him, and that agents who have been gunning for him for years are about to kill him. After capture and assessment, he is diagnosed with paranoid schizo- phrenia and his prognosis, as relayed to the family, is grim. It is a chronic, disabling brain disease with no hope of recovery. No, it was not caused by a bad childhood, but probably genetic, and the only treat- ment is medication. The man spends the rest of his life in psychiatric hospitals and halfway houses, on strong doses of psychiatric drugs. He died in 1998, a broken and hopeless man. Pamela J. Birrell is affiliated with the Psychology Department, 1227 University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403-1227. Journal of Trauma & Dissociation, Vol. 7(3) 2006 Available online at http://www.haworthpress.com/web/JTD @ 2006 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1300/J229v07n03_06 91 92 JOURNAL OF TRAUMA & DISSOCIATION This could be almost any man in the industrialized western world who was diagnosed with schizophrenia in the late twentieth century–es- pecially if the man is without financial resources or family support. He is a classic case. But this man is not any man, and he is not merely a case study designed to show the effectiveness of psychiatric drugs.
    [Show full text]
  • Distress Or Disability? Proceedings of a Symposium Held at Lancaster University, 15-16 November 2011
    Distress or Disability? Proceedings of a symposium held at Lancaster University, 15-16 November 2011 Published by Centre for Disability Research, Bowland North, Lancaster University, LA1 4YN, UK Symposium run in conjunction with: School of Social Work, University of Central Lancashire; and Mental Health in Higher Education. Editors: Jill Anderson, Bob Sapey and Helen Spandler Published 2012 ISBN: 978-1-86220-293-1 i Contents Introduction Jill Anderson, Bob Sapey and Helen Spandler 1 part one ...distress or disability? Anne Plumb (1994) 3 (Reprinted with permission of the Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People) part two Symposium Papers Setting the scene Helen Spandler 14 Incorporation, or not, of MH survivors into the disability movement Anne Plumb 18 Psycho-emotional disablism in the lives of people experiencing mental distress Donna Reeve 24 Disability and distress: towards understanding the vulnerable body-subject Floris Tomasini 30 Recovery as a process of decolonisation? History, politics and experience Brigit Morris Colton 33 Sorting trucks and going forth: Service provider and service user discourses of recovery. Tony Sparkes 34 Three relapses in one year: My story of recovery with bipolar disorder Kirsty Stevenson-Turner and Debbie Mayes 39 Complex trauma: A composite case study exploring responses to complex trauma across a lifespan Shelly Briggs and Fiona Cameron 43 Which model of disability can include voice hearing experiences? Bob Sapey 49 Diagnosed victims, survivors or disabled women? Exploring pathology and the
    [Show full text]
  • Critiquing Psychiatry, Narrating Trauma: Madness in Twentieth- Century North American Literature and Film
    Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 8-10-2020 11:00 AM Critiquing Psychiatry, Narrating Trauma: Madness in Twentieth- Century North American Literature and Film Sarah Blanchette, The University of Western Ontario Supervisor: Phu, Thy, The University of Western Ontario A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in English © Sarah Blanchette 2020 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Literature in English, North America Commons, and the Literature in English, North America, Ethnic and Cultural Minority Commons Recommended Citation Blanchette, Sarah, "Critiquing Psychiatry, Narrating Trauma: Madness in Twentieth-Century North American Literature and Film" (2020). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 7213. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/7213 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract This dissertation explores representations of trauma and mental distress in twentieth-century novels and films. Drawn on research that emphasizes the ways that marginalized communities— in particular women-coded, racialized, and Indigenous persons—have historically been pathologized, the thesis considers how select novels
    [Show full text]
  • Electroshock Facts
    ELECTROSHOCK FACTS We choose not to call Electroshock “Therapy” so we will not use the sanitised “ECT/Electroconvulsive Therapy” term to describe it. 1.!Electroshock is NOT treatment or “therapy”. It is a closed head electrical injury. !It causes a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) every time. 2.!It causes permanent irreversible brain damage. Electroshock “works” by damaging the brain. !Each treatment results in a temporary coma and often flat-lining of the brain waves, which is a !sign of impending brain death. 3. !It fails to give 55-84% of people ANY symptom relief whatsoever, leaving the rest with relief for !no more than a few weeks. 4.!It fails to treat the illness at all. It only “masks” it with head injury symptoms, so that the !“remission” goes as the brain recovers, leaving the illness intact. 5.!The results from `placebo’ ECT (placebo where the person gets the anaesthetic but NO !shock) are the same or better than for `real’ ECT. 6.!It causes steadily deteriorating mental function under than name of `Maintenance‘ !treatment. 7.!It can make the person 5 times MORE likely to commit suicide. 8 !It causes the person to lose past memory, new memory, and reduces their abilities in learning, !intelligence, problem solving, judgment, planning and concentration. 9,!It leaves a person so apathetic that they don’t complain, refuse to believe and/or is !unaware of the changes in them. 10!It gives a person severe emotional problems including stress disorders, depression and !mood swings. 11. It can cause life threatening complications during the treatment in up 1 in 6 people.
    [Show full text]
  • Schizophrenia: a Critical Psychiatry Perspective
    Schizophrenia: a critical psychiatry perspective Abstract Purpose of review: The term ‘schizophrenia has been hotly contested over recent years. The current review explores the meanings of the term, whether it is valid and helpful and how alternative conceptions of severe mental disturbance would shape clinical practice. Recent findings: Schizophrenia is a label that implies the presence of a biological disease, but no specific bodily pathology has been demonstrated, and the language of ‘illness’ and ‘disease’ is ill-suited to the complexities of mental health problems. Neither does the concept of schizophrenia delineate a group of people with similar patterns of behaviour and outcome trajectories. This is not to deny that some people show disordered speech and behaviour and associated mental suffering, but more generic terms, such as ‘psychosis’ or just ‘madness,’ would be preferable because they are less strongly associated with the disease model, and enable the uniqueness of each individual’s situation to be recognised. Summary: The disease model implicit in current conceptions of schizophrenia obscures the underlying functions of the mental health system; the care and containment of people who behave in distressing and disturbing ways. A new social framework is required that makes mental health services transparent, fair and open to democratic scrutiny. Keywords: schizophrenia, disease model; schizophrenia diagnosis; disease model of mental disorders; 2 Schizophrenia: a critical psychiatry perspective Introduction Over the last few decades, several commentators have challenged the concept of schizophrenia, and argued for different ways of framing the variety of problems the term currently designates. A critical psychiatry perspective attempts to shed light on these views and to explore their implications for the practical, clinical management of these problems.
    [Show full text]