Product Description

Aims to overturn the claim that psychiatric drugs work by correcting chemical imbalance, and analyzes the professional, commercial and political vested interests that have shaped this view. This work provides a comprehensive critique of research on drugs including antidepressants, antipsychotics and mood stabilizers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #53028 in Books
• Published on: 2009-10-23
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Review


Shortlisted for the 2009 Mind Book of the Year

 
'A revolutionary book written with the calm assurance of someone who knows her subject matter – and the people involved - extremely well. Essential reading for anyone interested in mental health.' - Dorothy Rowe, www.dorothyrowe.com.au


'This is a sober and thoughtful book. I found it very engaging and worth the effort to be better informed about a subject that affects many of our clients and impinges on our professional lives as therapists.' - Existential Analysis (Society for Existential Analysis)

'...Joanna Moncrieff, a practising psychiatrist and academic, has produced a devastating critique of the use of psychiatric drugs...This courageous book has the potential to revolutionise psychiatric practice and the care of people with many forms of mental distress. Many in the therapy professions will, I am sure, celebrate its message.' - Rachel Freeth, Therapy Today

'This book does what it says on the cover. It is a concise, powerful, well-referenced and well-constructed critique of psychiatric drug treatment...If I had the power to, I would make it essential reading on all counselling and psychotherapy trainings.' - Pete Sanders, Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal
 
'It should be compulsory reading for any person who thinks that people's behaviours and experiences are caused by chemical imbalances in their brain and that psychiatric medications treat these imbalances – psychiatrists, other professionals and people who are taking or considering taking these drugs...Read and share the book and speak out….come on - the emperor has no clothes!' - Guy Holmes, Journal of Critical Psychology, Counselling and Psychotherapy
 
'This remarkable book should be required reading...as the author exposes misconceptions and assumptions about biological mental illness...[it] is far from one-sided, and argues that rather than discarding drugs we should use them properly and concentrate on their effects rather than upon traditional but ultimately unscientific assumptions.' - Stuart Sorensen, Community Care
 
'This is a book that should change psychiatry forever.' Mental Health

About the Author
JOANNA MONCIREFF is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Mental Health Sciences at University College London, UK. She is co-founder of the Critical Psychiatry Network and writes critically about the use and misuse of psychiatric drug treatments, their history, and the influences that have promoted them.

Customer Reviews

Essential reading
This book is important and should be essential reading for all psychiatrists, politicians, service providers, and user groups. Why? Because Dr Joanna Moncreiff's central tenet is right, and the implications for service delivery are profound. There is little or no reliable evidence to suggest current drugs specifically treat an underlying biochemical abnormality. They are better seen as toxic or potentially toxic agents causing changes in brain function which may in some circumstances mask or alleviate symptoms. Rather than the current push within psychiatry to use available psychotrophic drugs to 'treat' as many people as possible, as early as possible, and to force extended compliance, the complete evidence base, in fact, suggests that use of drugs should be more limited and more cautious than it is at present, and that this would lead to better functional outcomes. This is counter-intuitive to many, which only serves to underline the importance of the book.
This book is psychiatry's Silent Spring. Joanna's book portends Scrambled Minds rather than a Silent Spring, but in both books we see illustrations of irresponsible behaviours and practices in the face of jaw dropping flaws and omissions in the evidence- base. Including the the planning, execution, interpretation, and dissemination of 'scientific' trials. The true nature of short term effect, long-term efficacy, safety, and cost/benefit is obscured by bad science and or the complexity of the issues involved.
Psychiatry is particularly vulnerable to systematic misreading and or distortion of the evidence-base because of the uncertainties surrounding diagnosis, mechanism of drug 'efficacy', identification of psychiatric and physical side-effects, and assessment of outcomes. The potential for habituation and or forced treatment, particularly long-term in the community, adds a unique ethical dimension. I have read much of the primary literature first hand, including the papers underpinning N.I.C.E guidelines, and Cochrane Reviews, and independently reached very similar conclusions to Joanna.
The book is closely argued and well referenced. Even if you disagree with some of it's overall premises, it is not legitimate to dismiss it. I urge you to read it if only as a prompt to a critical evaluation of the status quo, never a bad thing, and almost always an illuminating exercise .

THE PSYCHIATRIC TRUTH THAT DARES NOT SPEAK ITS NAME.
THE PSYCHIATRIC TRUTH THAT DARES NOT SPEAK ITS NAME.


Student massacres in the US since Columbine, are invariably heart-wrenching - last month there were four such multiple killings in a single week - what's happening and where will it end? There is one obvious explanation - but so far, it's proved too hot to handle. Perhaps now that Prozac and other psychiatric drugs are unravelling, an even harsher medical truth can emerge.

First let's get a grip on what goes on. Suppose all these student killers were drunk - that would make immediate sense. Alcohol is well known to confuse the mind, stifle normal rules of behaviour and thereby unleash violence. This would explain it all - acting, violently, while not in full control of their faculties - this is entirely characteristic of intoxication - and it closely resembles what all the perpetrators did. And the connection is closer than you think.

Alcohol itself does not feature in these massacres - but Dr Joanna MonCrieff's book makes the link painfully obvious, concluding (p224). ". . . exposing our miracle cures as psychoactive chemicals, which distort normal brain function by producing a state of intoxication." [my emphasis]. This is a tightly argued book providing irrefutable evidence that no psychiatric drug is superior to alcohol. Worse - whatever effects they produce arise through varying degrees of confusion or sedation - the ominously termed drug-induced `frontal lobe syndrome'. This is the awful psychiatric truth that dares not speak its name.

The myth she so punctiliously punctures has a long history of obfuscation. Fifty-five years ago the `Nine Hospital Study', which started the whole thing off, did not prove that the new `tranquilisers' cured schizophrenia. What they showed was that after 6 weeks there were fewer symptoms - the sedative effect, but that after 12 months the drugged patients were worse - the zombie effect. Psychiatrists and legislators have shamefully ignored this ever since.

Dr MonCrieff leaves no wriggle room for purblind psychiatrists or legislators. In my 45 years as a psychiatrist, I've never seen a clearer condemnation of today's psychiatry. The book's target audience is academic, and sadly its tone and price reflect this - but the last chapter says it all, and should be compulsory reading for every psychiatrist, every politician and every consumer of these increasingly potent drugs. Dangerous mandatory and toxic medical practices will otherwise continue unabated - until others match Dr MonCrieff's courage, and publicise this devastating message.



Dr Bob Johnson Wednesday, 27 February 2008

Consultant Psychiatrist,

Eye opener
I hope in time this book will be looked at as a changing factor into how medication is handed out in the mental health arena without a second thought. The book de mists the screen that is up which surrounds medication, its uses and its effects. I would reccomend this book to anyone that works in health, has family/friends in the mental health system, and most importantly people that take the drugs themselves.

This is a very important book that offers people knowledge and facts about medication used in mental health. It is written so that most people can understand without needing a medical degree, it does contain some jargon and statistics, but these are all explained with clarity.

a must have book.