A Behavioral Approach to Mental Disorders

There’s an interesting article in the June 2014 issue of the Journal of ECT. It’s written by Max Fink, MD, and is titled Celebrating 80 Years of Inducing Brain Seizures as Psychiatric Treatment. Dr. Fink is a psychiatrist and neurologist, and professor emeritus of psychiatry and neurology at the State University of New York, Stony Brook. The article is short (approximately 400 words), and is essentially a tribute to Ladislas Meduna for his discovery “…that induced seizures alleviated severe psychiatric disorders…”, which Dr. Fink describes as “…a remarkable medical advance…” ...

On August 15, 2014, McGill-Queens University Press published Psychiatry Disrupted: Theorizing Resistance and Crafting the (R)evolution. The work is a collection of papers by various authors, edited by Bonnie Burstow, Brenda A. LeFrançois, and Shaindl Diamond. There is a Foreword by Paula Caplan, and a Preface by Kate Millett. It is no secret that there is growing opposition to psychiatry. No longer marginalized and ignored, as in former decades, anti-psychiatry writers are proclaiming psychiatry’s spurious and destructive nature in a wide range of venues. Even the mainstream media is taking tentative steps in our direction. ...

On August 20, 2014, Psychiatry Advisor published an article on its website. The article was written by Leslie Citrome, MD, a professor of psychiatry at New York Medical College in Valhalla, NY, and a member of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Clinical Psychopharmacology. The article is called Is Bias Against Pharma-Funded Research Fair? This is an interesting title, because bias, by its very definition, is unfair. So the very wording of the question begs the question – which strikes me as unfair. But let’s put that aside. ...

I’ve recently read Stigma and mental health problems: why psychiatric professionals are the main culprits, by Gary Sidley, PhD. You can find it on his website. It’s a concise, accurate, and compelling account of how psychiatry stigmatizes its clients. This is a particularly important topic, in that psychiatrists routinely assert that it is we mental illness deniers and critics who create the stigma. Gary distinguishes public stigma (negative evaluation by the public), and self stigma, which arises when mental health clients accept these negative evaluations and begin to undervalue themselves. ...

There’s an interesting article in the current issue of the National Psychologist written by David Kirschner, PhD, a New York psychologist. The National Psychologist is a newspaper-type magazine that publishes articles of general interest to psychologists and others working in this field. Most issues contain a mix of opinion pieces, news, changes in government regulations, etc… Dr. Kirschner’s article is titled Mass shooters received only limited treatment. Here are some quotes: ...

On August 19, 2014, the Annals of Internal Medicine published a paper titled Atypical Antipsychotic Drugs and the Risk for Acute Kidney Injury [AKI] and Other Adverse Outcomes in Older Adults. The authors were Joseph Hwang et al, and the study was conducted at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences in Ontario, Canada. The primary funding source was the Academic Medical Organization of Southwestern Ontario. The principal investigator was Amit X. Garg, MD, PhD, a kidney specialist at the London Health Science Center and the London Kidney Clinical Research Unit in Ontario, Canada. ...

I recently read Peter Kinderman’s new book, A Prescription for Psychiatry, which was published on September 3 by Palgrave Macmillan. The overall message of the work is captured nicely in the subtitle: Why We Need a Whole New Approach to Mental Health and Wellbeing. Dr. Kinderman is Professor of Clinical Psychology, Head of the Institute of Psychology, Health and Society at the University of Liverpool, and an honorary Consultant Clinical Psychologist with Mersey Care NHS Trust in the UK. ...

On July 1, the very eminent psychiatrist Ronald Pies, MD, wrote an article for Psychiatric Times titled Positivism, Humanism and the Case for Psychiatric Diagnosis. The article also appeared in Medscape on August 20. Dr. Pies begins by discussing websites “…that critically examine psychiatry.” These websites, he tells us, "…vary from the viscerally enraged, to the politely skeptical, to the constructively critical, and everything in between. The worst antipsychiatry Web sites, in my view, are veritable bastions of bigotry, in which psychiatrists are subjected to invective and abuse that would never be tolerated if directed, say, at some ethnic or racial minority." ...

In January 2014, the journal Research on Social Work Practice published a special issue: A Critical Appraisal of the DSM-5: Social Work Perspectives. There were many excellent articles in this volume, some of which I have highlighted in earlier posts. One of the very outstanding articles is The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as a Major Form of Dehumanization in the Modern World, by Eileen Gambrill, PhD, a graduate school Professor at the School of Social Welfare, University of California, Berkeley. ...

Robert Findling, MD, is a pediatrician and a psychiatrist. He is the Director of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, and Vice President of Psychiatric Services and Research at the Kennedy Krieger Institute. On July 31, Dr. Findling published a brief video (and article) on Medscape: Adverse Events Caused by a Drug Warning? Dr. Findling’s article is essentially a commentary on a study by Christine Lu et al, which was published by the BMJ on June 18. Here is the conclusion paragraph from the Lu et al report: ...