OPEN your eyes to Psychiatry, Psychiatric drugs & practices in the 21st century.
"Diet, injections, and injunctions will combine, from a very early age, to produce the sort of character and the sort of beliefs that the authorities consider desirable.
And any serious criticism of the powers that be will become psychologically impossible."
~ Bertrand Russell (The Impact of Science on Society)
"Enjoy yourself -- it's later than you think."
- Socrates
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Psychiatric assessment typically involves a mental status examination and taking a case history, and psychological tests may be administered. Physical examinations may be conducted and occasionally neuroimages or other neurophysiological measurements taken.
Individuals with mental health conditions are commonly referred to as patients but may also be called clients, consumers, or service recipients. They may come under the care of a psychiatric physician or other psychiatric practitioners by various paths, the two most common being self-referral or referral by a primary-care physician. Alternatively, a person may be referred by hospital medical staff, by court order, involuntary commitment, or, in the UK and Australia, by sectioning under a mental health law.
Forced drugging and the "lack of insight" label
According to a report published by the U.S. National Council on Disability:
Involuntary treatment is extremely rare outside the psychiatric system, allowable only in such cases as unconsciousness or the inability to communicate. People with psychiatric disabilities, on the other hand, even when they vigorously protest treatments they do not want, are routinely subjected to them anyway, on the justification that they "lack insight" or are unable to recognize their need for treatment because of their "mental illness." In practice, "lack of insight" becomes disagreement with the treating professional, and people who disagree are labeled "noncompliant" or "uncooperative with treatment."
Diagnostic procedures vary but official criteria are listed in manuals, the most common being the ICD from the World Health Organization and the DSM from the American Psychiatric Association. Psychiatric medication is a central treatment option, which is largely unique to this medical specialty along with rarer procedures such as Electroconvulsive therapy. Psychotherapy is also a major treatment option, although it is also the specialty of other mental health professions.
Psychiatric services may be provided on an inpatient or outpatient basis. In certain authorized cases this may be done on an involuntary basis. Both the research and clinical application of this medical specialty are considered interdisciplinary. Because of this, various subspecialties and theoretical approaches exist. Psychiatrists can be considered physicians who specialize in the doctor-patient relationship utilizing some of medicine's newest classification schemes, diagnostic tools and treatments.
Psychiatry can be said to have originated in the 5th century BC, while the first hospitals for the mentally ill were created in the middle ages. The 18th century saw the development of psychiatry as a recognized field and mental health institutions came to utilize more elaborate, as well as some more humane, treatments.
The 19th century saw a massive increase in patient populations. The 20th century saw a rebirth of a biological understanding of mental disorders as well the introduction of disease classifications and psychiatric medications.
So, do you...
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