Critiques of a New Research Study on Antidepressants
A new meta-analysis claiming to prove once and for all that antidepressants are an effective treatment for moderate to severe depression was published just a few days...
A Case Against Antidepressants
From Newsroom: University of Auckland researchers make a case against the chemical imbalance theory of mental illness, arguing that biological explanations and treatments for emotional...
Deprescribing Starts With Shared Decision Making
From The Lown Institute: Many of the current guidelines and tools available for deprescribing medications use a "one-size-fits-all" approach, merely providing lists of harmful drugs...
If a Drug Company Publishes a Magazine, is it Journalism?
From Undark Magazine: Bayer, the German pharmaceutical and agricultural science conglomerate, has launched a digital magazine covering the ethical and social implications of new biotechnologies....
Congress Did Something Extraordinary for Vulnerable Children
From The Intercept: A new piece of legislation attempting to revolutionize the foster care system recently passed despite significant opposition. The Family First Prevention Services...
Drug Treatment of ADHD – Tenuous Scientific Basis
From Tidsskriftet: Over the past three decades, there has been a dramatic increase in the diagnosis and pharmacological treatment of ADHD. Recent systematic reviews reveal...
Psychiatry’s Little Known Role in Creating the Holocaust
From NewBostonPost: In light of the recent commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, it is important to acknowledge the role that eugenics, a field developed by psychiatrists...
Why Aren’t Providers Screaming About the Mental Health Act?
In this piece for Tales from the Madhouse, Gary Sidley critiques the Mental Health Act as a form of legal discrimination against people deemed "mentally...
Petition: Protect PTSD Treatments That Work!
The American Psychological Association recently issued a guideline recommending only short-term, structured, and symptom-focused therapies for the treatment of PTSD; the guideline may be...
Training Program Decreases Police Force and Arrests for Mental Health Crisis Calls
Colorado police trained in crisis intervention infrequently use force or arrest individuals experiencing a mental health crisis and are likely to transfer individuals to a treatment facility.
Care Homes Over-Prescribing Drugs for Residents with Dementia
From The Guardian: According to a new Human Rights Watch report, U.S. nursing homes are inappropriately prescribing antipsychotics to an estimated 179,000 residents with dementia each...
Pharma-Funded Charities v. Health and Human Services
From The Health Law & Policy Brief: Last month, Patient Services Inc. (PSI), a pharmaceutical industry-funded charity, launched a lawsuit against the Department of Health...
Pharma, Under Attack for Drug Prices, Started an Industry War
From The Washington Post: In 2017, numerous politicians, advocacy groups, and other stakeholders began to raise questions about the rising costs of prescription drugs. Under attack,...
Teenage Antidepressants “Doing More Harm Than Good”
From BBC: A leading UK psychiatrist, Dr. David Healy, speaks out about the dangers of the growing prescription of antidepressants to young people under age...
DeJarnette Sanitarium
From Atlas Obscura: In the 1930s, hundreds of people with mental disabilities committed to the now abandoned DeJarnette Sanitarium were forcibly sterilized and experimented on by the hospital's eugenicist namesake.
Spending on Social Services Improves Health Outcomes
Canadian study finds that social service spending is associated with a decrease in mortality and increase in life expectancy.
Polypharmacy is Compounding the Opioid Epidemic
From The Lown Institute: The recent deaths of several beloved musicians, actors, and other public figures have brought to light the dangers of taking multiple, potentially fatal drugs.
"In...
The Unfortunate Experiment, Updated
From Fear and Loathing in Bioethics: A new fifteen-minute television documentary investigates New Zealand's "unfortunate experiment," a horrific case of nonconsensual experimentation at the National...
Seeking Justice
My life flashed before my eyes as my entire medical history over the last decade was rewritten from having a genetic brain disease to being a victim of a medical scam. It was bittersweet, for I realized that I was not sick and dying, but I had been robbed of so many years of my life due to the psychiatrist’s lies. Now I am suing my former psychiatrist for damages.
He Tenido Un Sueño (I Had a Dream)
In this piece for La Otra Psiquiatría, Fernando Colina describes his vision for a compassionate, non-pathologizing mental health system. Below is the full translation of his...
The Pharmaceutical Industry is No Stranger to Fake News
From STAT: The notion of "fake news" has recently become a widespread topic of discourse. However, the pharmaceutical industry has been using tactics that involve spreading...
Football Destroyed My Husband’s Mind
In this op-ed for The New York Times, Emily Kelly, the wife of former NFL player Rob Kelly, shares the devastating impact that a professional...
Your Pills Are Spying On You
From Pacific Standard: The new Abilify MyCite pill, which contains a digital sensor that tracks whether a patient has ingested the drug, has the potential...
Multisystemic Therapy No More Effective than Standard Care for Antisocial Behavior
Study counters previous evidence supporting multisystemic therapy, finding adolescents are just as likely to have out-of-home placements when receiving multisystemic therapy versus management as usual.
Unnecessary Medical Care: More Common Than You Might Think
From NPR: A recent report by the Washington Health Alliance has helped to quantify the epidemic of medical overtreatment and healthcare waste.
"What the group found...
