The Observer today has a number of interesting articles.
How to Spot a Murder's Brain
Psychiatrists under fire in mental health battle
Medicine's big new battleground: does mental illness really exist?
Do we need to change the way we are thinking about mental illness?
Although the comments section after each of them are frustrating and annoying.
Three of them, all but the 'Murder's Brain' are part of a series brought about by the statement to be released on Monday 13 May from the Division of Clinical Psychology of the British Psychological Society calling for a fundamental re-thinking of how professionals understand and treat mental distress.
After that statement is released I will have a go at saying more about it.
Meanwhile mental distress exists and sometimes people need help with it from a range of sources including medicine. One of the potential upsides is that people will start looking beyond medicine at ways to make mental distress less likely and to ameliorate its effects. One of the potential down sides of moving away from the medical model is that it will become an excuse for further cutting the already inadequate services for people with mental distress. It is also important that we do not jump into the Positive Psychology position of just helping individuals with building up resilience but look at broader social and societal issues as well.
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