Cracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good

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For these individuals, there has become an imbalance in provision, with so many offered medical interventions versus talking therapies and social psychological provision, which may better facilitate meaningful change and recovery. It has taken me a while to get around to writing this review because I felt that I needed time to do it justice. In many ways this is a scary book and I feel that I might need to read something that puts the other side of the story to really feel that I have a reasonable grasp of the issues. Exposé of the practices of contemporary psychiatry and its uncomfortable, perhaps even dangerous, relationship with pharmaceutical companies who profit from an increasingly medicated public.

Cracked by M James Davies | Waterstones Cracked by M James Davies | Waterstones

Perhaps this altered state of mind can be helpful to alleviate painful emotions and give us a chance to make changes to our lives so the drugs are not needed. Yet, this is not the case if we are told that those drugs are a cure and we must stay on them for life. And not if we are left finding the withdrawals from those drugs unbearable. I wonder how extensive Mr. Davies' literature search was; if he needs evidence of the biological root of schizophrenia look at the life work of Professor Eve Johnstone. Polish rights in Hitler’s Last Plot : The 139 Men, Women, and Children Saved from Imminent Execution in the Final Days of the Third Reich by Jeremy Dronfield & Ian Sayer

I usually love books about how messed up the DSM, Big Pharma, and the social sciences are, but this book was terrible and here is why: After decades of trying to prove [the chemical imbalance theory], researchers have still come up empty-handed.’ It is exposed this week in a new book that should be read by every doctor, and also by everyone in politics and the media, not to mention any concerned citizen.” I can't believe that drug companies can have this type of relationship with health professionals--effectively paying them to use and aggressively promote their products to patients. Of course, the professionals are then going to prescribe these drugs, no one is immune to this kind of monetary temptation. Patients have been diagnosed with chemical imbalances, despite that no test exists to support such a claim, and that there is no real conception of what a correct chemical balance would look like.’ (Dr David Kaiser, Psychiatric Times)

2013) Cracked: why psychiatry is doing more harm than good (2013) Cracked: why psychiatry is doing more harm than good

Dr Davies said, “by sedating people to the causes and solutions for their socially rooted distress – both literally and ideologically – our mental health sector has stilled the impulse for social reform, which has distracted people from the real origins of their despair, and has favoured results that are primarily economic while presiding over the worst outcomes in our health care system”.In Britain, approaching a quarter of the adult population take a psychiatric drug in a year, an increase of over 500% since 1980. Despite this rise in prescriptions, the prevalence of mental health problems and disability have also increased. Reading this book was eye-opening and pretty scary. If taken literally I can imagine that no one would be able to trust any health professional at all. He uses sensationalism in places that I felt was unnecessary to get the point across. His main point is that the health profession is turning the stresses and strains of everyday life into treatable illnesses for monetary gain. His focus is on mental health which cannot be measured biologically in the same way that physical/visible illness can. He has a valid point with 48 million anti-depressant prescriptions in England in just one year! The theory is that the psychiatric illness is caused by some sort of imbalance in brain chemistry and the drugs will correct this imbalance. However, the imbalance has never been shown to exist. Even in the case of depression the evidence is pretty clear ...as the following citation indicates: A well-written book...a positive contribution to the debate about whether psychiatry can become a more open practice." At Roehampton, we are focused on creating new knowledge and ideas that help us to understand our world and make it a better place. We are ranked the most research-intensive modern university in the UK. Our staff undertake world-class research across all our academic departments. This means that if you join us as a student, you will benefit from being taught by leading thinkers from your first year of study.