Mad in America

JANUARY 20, 2024

T he decades-long attempt to locate the gene or genes for schizophrenia has failed, according to a new article in Psychiatric Research by prominent schizophrenia researcher E. Fuller Torrey. In the article, Torrey reviews the history of the Human Genome Project, their hopes for identifying the genetic basis for schizophrenia, and how those hopes have been dashed by the complete failure to find anything of the sort.

Genetics and mental health 145

Genetics and mental health Bipolar disorder Poverty and mental health Trauma and the brain 145

Lawyers with Depression

JANUARY 30, 2024

[link] - NPR News: "Patients say keto diet helps with their mental illness. Science is racing to understand.

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Bullet Psych

JANUARY 21, 2024

Today we will discuss Circadian Rhythm Sleep-Wake Disorders (CRSWDs). We will cover an introduction, definitions, diagnostic criteria, risk factors, and treatment. Today's Content Level: All levels (Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced) Refresher on the Circadian Rhythm 1 Circadian rhythm = roughly 24-hour cycle that is synchronized with the day-night cycle of the Earth.

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Bipolar disorder Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Anxiety disorders Personality disorders 52

Harmony United Psychiatric Care

JANUARY 18, 2024

What is Mental Misattribution?

Education 52

Education 52

Santa Barbara Sanctuary Centers

JANUARY 16, 2024

Last months groundbreaking ceremony marked Sanctuary Centers initiation of its forthcoming new building. To witness the launch of this transformative community benefit project was, of course, a thrilling moment. The project, which will provide 34 units of new housing along with co-located medical, dental, and behavioral health clinics, represents a milestone moment in the nonprofits 50-year history of addressing the holistic needs of individuals experiencing mental illness.

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Nonprofits 52

Dr. Deb

JANUARY 11, 2024

One of my favorite things when writing children's books is when my wonderful and talented illustrator, Kyra Teis , takes my notes and creates the characters and illustrations for the picture book. It's so exciting to see my ideas come to life, and to have the beginning artwork take shape. My next book will focus on jealousy in children in late 2024.

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Mad in America

JANUARY 16, 2024

S ince the onset of the pandemic, misery and mental disorder have increased, raising considerable concern about mental health. It has become obvious that we need to be better at addressing issues related to our psychological well-being. A well-substantiated body of scientific research argues for rejecting psychiatry’s biological/medical paradigm for mental health and mental disorder and replacing it with a social/psychological paradigm.

Genetics and mental health 145

Genetics and mental health Trauma and the brain Anxiety disorders Construction 145

World Psychiatric Association (WPA)

JANUARY 11, 2024

We are pleased to announce that the Q4 2023 edition of the WPA Review has now been published! Similar to previous releases, all WPA members will receive the eNewsletter via email, featuring concise reports submitted by our esteemed members worldwide. Additionally, you can access this edition (as well as past editions) of the eNewsletter here. The WPA Review - Q4 2023 includes a wide range of reports, highlighting the latest developments and events since our previous edition.

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Mental Health America Blog

JANUARY 9, 2024

Mental health resources for global concerns MHA Admin Tue, 01/09/2024 - 11:59 Background Color blue Find resources for global conflict

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Mad in America

JANUARY 3, 2024

F or the longest time, the field of psychiatry remained silent about the STAR*D scandal. Ed Pigott and colleagues first published a deconstruction of the study in 2010 , detailing the protocol violations that the STAR*D investigators had employed to inflate the cumulative remission rate, and even after Pigott and collaborators published a RIAT reanalysis of the study findings this past July, there was silence from psychiatry regarding this scandal.

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Neurotransmitters and mental health Hospitality Education Self-awareness 144

Mad in America

JANUARY 6, 2024

“G et help, you deserve to be happy!” Ads for the for-profit therapy company BetterHelp are everywhere: on television, public radio, podcasts, social media, and in magazines. It’s not surprising for a company that reportedly spent over $100 million on advertising in 2023, making it the country’s projected leading sponsor of podcasts. The messages are appealing, boasting more than 30,000 therapists available by text, phone, chat, or video at an affordable price.

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Insurance Aging and mental health Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Self-awareness 143

Mad in America

JANUARY 18, 2024

From CounterPunch : “Researchers have long known that any single antidepressant drug is little more effective than a placebo in the majority of trials, shown to be less effective than a placebo in some studies, and generally found to be ‘ clinically negligible’ with respect to depression remission, while often resulting in severe adverse effects; for example, resulting in a higher percentage of sexual dysfunction than depression remission.

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Mad in America

JANUARY 25, 2024

In a recent study published in BMJ Mental Health , a team led by Ethan Sahker from Kyoto University’s Department of Health Promotion and Human Behavior, alongside an international cohort of researchers, confronts a pressing question in depression treatment: What is the smallest beneficial effect of antidepressants that patients deem worthwhile given their burdens?

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Depression treatment 142

Mad in America

JANUARY 10, 2024

Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared on our affiliate site, Mad in Finland. In it, a mental health worker and former long-term patient describes the aspects of treatment and life experiences that helped with recovery, as well as which aspects hindered recovery. I have spent several years of my life in various psychiatric institutions and have come to be seen as a chronic patient whose chances of recovery have not been considered very high.

Sleep and mental health 141

Sleep and mental health 141

Mad in America

JANUARY 4, 2024

Editor’s Note: This article, written by Heidi Tommila, was first published on our affiliate site, Mad in Finland. T he title of this article is from Jaakko Seikkula’s book Dialogue Improves—but Why? One subheading in chapter seven: “Psychological behavior is part of dialogue, not pathology.” I read the book last winter, but I’ve skimmed through it again a bit now and thought I’d write a few words about it.

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Construction 137

Mad in America

JANUARY 9, 2024

T here is a core concept shaping the ‘market’ in health, the concept of an assay, that few doctors or patients understand. Even fewer spot the role assays play. This article explains what assays are, how they entered healthcare and the consequences of failing to grasp the role they play. Before Thalidomide By 1950, we were starting to get the first new drugs that worked well.

Sleep and mental health 136

Sleep and mental health Legal Healthcare Pharmaceuticals 136

Mad in America

JANUARY 22, 2024

Editor’s Note: Over the next several months, Mad in America is publishing a serialized version of Les Ruthven’s book, Much of U.S. Healthcare is Broken: How to Fix It. In this blog, he addresses increases in suicide and homicide caused by antidepressant drugs. Each Monday, a new section of the book is published, and all chapters are archived here.

Healthcare 134

Healthcare Trauma and the brain Insurance 134

Mad in America

JANUARY 31, 2024

F or two and a half years, until last April, I worked as an occupational therapist in two public mental health inpatient units in Melbourne, Australia. During my work, I experienced a devastating process of disillusioning and moral injury, witnessing the mental health field’s harmful behaviours towards our clients. This experience brought me to the edge of madness, as well as many physical illnesses.

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Healthcare Self-awareness 132

Mad in America

JANUARY 24, 2024

A recent article published in the Health Expectations journal reveals that discontinuing the use of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI withdrawal) has an impact on the emotional, cognitive, and social aspects of the lives of users, in addition to causing physical withdrawal symptoms. The study, led by Raqeeb Mahmood from the University of Bath, also suggests that withdrawing from SSRIs has positive effects on health.

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Aging and mental health 132

Mad in America

JANUARY 24, 2024

P recision medicine promises a new era of highly targeted treatments akin to precision strikes in warfare, aimed at ‘combating’ disease at the most individual, localised level. Hailed as the future of mental health care, it conjures images of medical interventions as carefully planned and executed military operations, striking with lethal accuracy at the heart of mental suffering while minimising collateral damage.

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Genetics and mental health Poverty and mental health Resilience and coping Healthcare 122

Mad in America

JANUARY 5, 2024

From Hole Ousia : “I see that there have been a number of responses to this letter: Reversing the rate of antidepressant prescribing. I worked as an NHS psychiatrist for over 25 years and as part of my continuing medical education regularly came across the work of a number of the respondents. British Psychiatry is heavily influenced by opinion leaders who are often paid by industry.

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Education 121

Mad in America

JANUARY 30, 2024

I t is my contention that “trauma/addiction experts” and psychiatrists cause unnecessary harm to people who are suffering and feeling emotional pain by categorizing them, generalizing about their unique behaviours and by labeling certain types of behaviours as “addictions” and “mental illnesses”. Also, the validity and relevance of describing people’s behaviours in terms of their “mental health” is questionable as I believe that people suffer when they are mistreated and not loved, and it is a n

Sleep and mental health 119

Sleep and mental health Pharmaceuticals 119

Mad in America

JANUARY 4, 2024

From KFF Health News : “Living with diabetes, Carlton ‘PeeWee’ Gautney Jr. relied on a digital device about the size of a deck of playing cards to pump insulin into his bloodstream. The pump, manufactured by device maker Medtronic, connected plastic tubing to an insulin reservoir, which Gautney set to release doses of the vital hormone over the course of the day.

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Manufacturing Legal 118

Mad in America

JANUARY 25, 2024

F amily estrangement is on the rise, headlines read, followed by many articles about setting healthy boundaries, communication, self-care and emotional maturity. However, a recent article titled “Growing All The Way Up” (the online version is titled “ The Words Every Adult Child Needs to Hear ,” January 2024) in Psychology Today suggests adult children estranged with their parents take control of creating the life they want by “getting past old hurts” that they may have with their pa

Neurotransmitters and mental health 114

Neurotransmitters and mental health Aging and mental health 114

Mad in America

JANUARY 11, 2024

T ony and Sherita’s story is epic — so long, complex, and fraught with difficulties that rendering it succinctly in a single story is all but impossible. Tony, who lives in Virginia near his mother, lost his speech and eye contact at a very early age, when he received an autism diagnosis. By the time he was 11 years old, his neurologist gave him an extremely poor lifelong prognosis.

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Autism spectrum Aging and mental health Hospitality Bipolar disorder 114

Mad in America

JANUARY 6, 2024

Below are excerpts from a talk given by Dina Tyler — a psych survivor, family counselor, and cofounder of Bay Area Hearing Voices, among others — at UCSF Grand Rounds last month. “I was and still would be non-compliant. I’ve spent my life creating compassionate alternatives to the traditional mental health system because my hospitalization was really bad.

Sleep and mental health 112

Sleep and mental health Trauma and the brain Hospitality Legal 112

Mad in America

JANUARY 27, 2024

T he results from the RADAR trial have been discussed in several comments and blogposts, and in our case, in a letter in Lancet Psychiatry calling for attention to the dignity of risk-taking. The RADAR trial, the largest study in the field to date, led by Professor Joanna Moncrieff, tested the hypothesis “…. that antipsychotic reduction would improve social functioning with only a small increase in relapse rate.

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Self-awareness Manufacturing Legal Healthcare 110

Mad in America

JANUARY 19, 2024

From The New York Times : “Employee mental health services have become a billion-dollar industry. New hires, once they have found the restrooms and enrolled in 401(k) plans, are presented with a panoply of digital wellness solutions, mindfulness seminars, massage classes, resilience workshops, coaching sessions and sleep apps. These programs are a point of pride for forward-thinking human resource departments, evidence that employers care about their workers.

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Sleep and mental health 109

Mad in America

JANUARY 17, 2024

M ark Freeman is a renowned author and a pioneering voice in the emerging field of the psychological humanities. He serves as Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Society in the Department of Psychology at the College of the Holy Cross. His body of work, including the critically acclaimed Toward the Psychological Humanities: A Modest Manifesto for the Future of Psychology (Routledge, 2023), offers a profound reimagining of psychology, interweaving it with the arts and humanities to better under

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Self-awareness Construction Education 109

Mad in America

JANUARY 12, 2024

I was 17 years old; a week away from turning 18. I was experiencing my first manic episode, brought on by a traumatic event. I reacted to my emotions with the weight of stress on my chest. I was assaulted, by someone who was supposed to love and protect me. I confided in my mother, who seemed to believe me at first. This was a case of textbook narcissism, as my attacker placed all of the blame on me, and meticulously manipulated my mother.

Sleep and mental health 105

Sleep and mental health Trauma and the brain Hospitality Aging and mental health 105

Mad in America

JANUARY 15, 2024

Editor’s Note: Over the next several months, Mad in America is publishing a serialized version of Les Ruthven’s book, Much of U.S. Healthcare is Broken: How to Fix It. In this blog, he addresses sexual dysfunction on antidepressants, increased suicidality on antidepressants, and explores a ghostwritten study claiming effectiveness of antidepressants for children and adolescents.

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Healthcare Pharmaceuticals 104

Mad in America

JANUARY 18, 2024

O ne of the issues that frequently come up in these pages, and in other places where institutional approaches to ‘mental health difficulties’ are discussed, is the discrimination (or stigmatisation) suffered by people identified as ‘mentally unsound’. Beyond individual accounts there are heaps of formal research data that point to damaging effects upon family life and access to housing, and upon friendships, intimate relationships and attitudes to childcare.

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Self-awareness Construction Technology Pharmaceuticals 104

Mad in America

JANUARY 3, 2024

From Psychology Today/Joanna Cheek MD : “People come to see me for help with their depression, anxiety, eating disorder, addiction, or any other label that fails to adequately describe why we hurt. These diagnoses take on a life of their own, where we try to treat ‘the depression’ instead of addressing the problem it’s signalling. But what if depression, anxiety, and the mixture of mental health problems we face aren’t the actual problem?

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Eating disorders 104

Mad in America

JANUARY 25, 2024

In The New York Times , Christina Jewett and Benjamin Mueller report on the widespread prescription of the asthma drug Singulair despite severe known harms including suicidality, especially among children—and despite a black-box warning added decades after the drug was first marketed amid early indications of the risks: “In early 2020, the FDA responded to decades of escalating concerns about a commonly prescribed drug for asthma and allergies by deploying one of its most potent tools: a stark

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Education 103

Mad in America

JANUARY 2, 2024

“Creating Our Mental Health”: Welcome to a conversation between two social therapists who meet regularly to share and advance our therapeutic work. We hope these dialogues can support and stimulate others who are integrating developmental conversations into their therapeutic practices and personal growth. See the first post in the series for a brief explanation of what social therapy is and the perspectives we’re coming from in our dialogues.

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Mad in America

JANUARY 19, 2024

I had researched a great deal on the origins of psychosis, in a need to understand my own, but the majority of what I came across in the mainstream was all theory-based via invisible writers, many long dead. A lot of what was written was by men, and the language quite intellectual and dry. I wanted to hear from people with experiences not theories. I knew of someone who worked in the local mental health system.

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Mad in America

JANUARY 29, 2024

Editor’s Note: Over the next several months, Mad in America is publishing a serialized version of Les Ruthven’s book, Much of U.S. Healthcare is Broken: How to Fix It. In this blog, he addresses the research showing that psychiatric hospitalization increases suicidality as well as further dangers of psychiatric drugs, including tardive dyskinesia.

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Healthcare Pharmaceuticals Hospitality Aging and mental health 102