‘Anti-psychiatry rhetoric’ presents challenge for profession

The President of the College of Psychiatrists has said growing anti-psychiatry rhetoric represents a significant challenge for the profession.

Speaking at the College’s Winter Conference in Limerick last month, Dr Lorcan Martin, Consultant in General Adult Psychiatry, remarked upon “negativity” levelled at the specialty.  

Dr Martin told the Medical Independent (MI) this commentary partly stemmed from the controversial history of the specialty in Ireland and internationally.

He noted, for example, that psychiatry only had effective pharmaceutical treatments from the 1950s. Historically, he said, many people with serious mental illness were consigned to institutions.

“Modern psychiatry is very different. It is an advanced medical specialty,” stated Dr Martin. “Part of it is that we are not seen as scientists or real doctors in some respects, even though we treat very real, very serious illness.”

He also said that psychiatrists only admitted patients involuntarily as a “last resort” and these admissions were not common.

“There is a certain rhetoric that psychiatry wants to ‘lock people up’ and treat them against their will. We don’t want to lock anyone up, but every so often you come across someone that is so seriously ill they don’t know they’re ill, and they’re a risk to themselves or other people…” he stated.

Dr Martin said he had a caseload of several hundred patients, and none of them were inpatients at the time of speaking to MI. He had not had a patient admitted involuntarily in six months.

Now in the second year of a three-year term as College President, Dr Martin described his experience to date as “fantastic”.

He also noted the importance of advocacy on behalf of patients with mental illness.

“Advocacy is really important, particularly for patients. [There was a saying], ‘there’s no votes in psychiatry’ and what that meant was people with mental illness often quietly disappear into the background because they have no-one to speak for them. It was a quote I heard when I started in psychiatry over 30 years ago.”

In this respect, there is a special onus on psychiatrists to advocate on behalf of these patients, he stated.

The College’s Winter Conference heard concerns about under-funding of mental health services and proposed changes to mental health legislation .

For further coverage, see: CPI | The College of Psychiatrists of Ireland | Irish Medical Society

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