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“There’s No Word for Depression in Zulu”: Inside South Africa’s Mental Health Crisis

Mad in America

R esearch has found South Africa consistently ranks in the bottom three performing countries in terms of global mental health. LANGA TOWNSHIP, SOUTH AFRICA – JANUARY 28, 2014 – Schoolchildren poses for a photograph along a roadway in Langa, South Africa, a township located on the outskirts of Cape Town.

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Giving Caregivers a Platform: Meagan, Mother of Matt

Mad in America

For a period of four years, from 2014 through 2018 during his decline and overwhelm, Matt was prescribed five different antidepressants layered on top of one another without tapering, which ignited a cycle of adverse reactions. From that day on, he could no longer sleep. It begins, as such stories do, with common human struggles.

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A Remarkable Feat: A Psychiatric Patient Changed the Law on Restraints

Mad in America

He entered a settlement with the Ministry of Health in December 2021, which obliged the government to amend the Psychiatry Act, so that the rights for psychiatric patients subjected to belt fixation were improved. And he insisted that the government should ask the National Board of Health to draw up an action plan for autism.

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How Psychiatrists Responded to the Launch of Our New ECT Survey

Mad in America

The two positive themes were ‘symptom reduction’ and ‘sleep’. Maybe helpful for a short time, but likely not worth it in the end they clouded my perceptions and sense of self very badly’ ‘They are not “antipsychotic” they just helped me sleep.’ ‘I 10 Thematic analysis identified 749 negative, 180 positive, and 53 mixed statements.

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My Red October – An Army Veteran’s Crucible to Recovery

Mad in America

It all started in 2014, less than a year after my honorable discharge from the Army, and shortly after returning home from Afghanistan, where I’d served as an Apache helicopter mechanic. Overwhelmed, I sought help from my VA mental health team. As a result of stopping the Prozac my sleep schedule was destroyed.

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Critical Psychiatry Textbook, Chapter 15: Withdrawal of Psychiatric Drugs

Mad in America

In 2020, the UK mental health charity Mind said it signposted people to street drug charities to help them withdraw from depression pills because of the lack of available alternatives. In November 2019, the Danish National Board of Health issued a guideline about depression pills to family doctors that was dangerous.

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How Epigenetics Could Revolutionize ADHD Care

ADDitude

A 101 on Epigenetics Reading Genes Genes play an important role in shaping a wide range of traits and characteristics, from hair and eye color to susceptibility to mental health conditions. Epigenetic alterations have been linked to numerous poor health outcomes. Yet, genetic influences are less fixed than one might think.