The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is the main professional organization of psychiatrists and trainee psychiatrists in the United States, and the largest psychiatric organization in the world. Its some 37,800 members are mainly American but some are international. The association publishes various journals and pamphlets, as well as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). The DSM codifies psychiatric conditions and is used worldwide as a guide for diagnosing disorders.
David Healy, a professor of psychiatry at Bangor University in the United Kingdom, is a psychiatrist, psychopharmacologist, scientist and author. His main areas of research are the contribution of antidepressants to suicide, conflict of interest between pharmaceutical companies and academic medicine, and the history of pharmacology. Healy has written more than 150 peer-reviewed articles, 200 other articles, and 20 books, including The Antidepressant Era, The Creation of Psychopharmacology, The Psychopharmacologists Volumes 1–3, Let Them Eat Prozac and Mania: A Short History of Bipolar Disorder.
The Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IoPPN) is a research institution dedicated to discovering what causes mental illness and diseases of the brain. In addition, its aim is to help identify new treatments for them and ways to prevent them in the first place. The IoPPN is a school of King's College London, England, previously known as the Institute of Psychiatry (IoP).
Clinical trials publication is having research published in a peer reviewed journal following clinical trials. Most investigators will want to have such a publication but the nature of clinical trials may create special considerations and obstacles.
Robert Whitaker is an American journalist and author, writing primarily about medicine, science, and history. He is the author of five books, three of which cover the history or practice of modern psychiatry. He has won numerous awards for science writing, and in 1998 he was part of a team writing for the Boston Globe that was shortlisted for the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for a series of articles questioning the ethics of psychiatric research in which unsuspecting patients were given drugs expected to heighten their psychosis. He is the founder and publisher of Mad in America, a webzine critical of the modern psychiatric establishment.
The biopsychiatry controversy is a dispute over which viewpoint should predominate and form a basis of psychiatric theory and practice. The debate is a criticism of a claimed strict biological view of psychiatric thinking. Its critics include disparate groups such as the antipsychiatry movement and some academics.
Loren Richard Mosher was an American psychiatrist, clinical professor of psychiatry, expert on schizophrenia and the chief of the Center for Studies of Schizophrenia in the National Institute of Mental Health (1968–1980). Mosher spent his professional career advocating for humane and effective treatment for people diagnosed as having schizophrenia and was instrumental in developing an innovative, residential, home-like, non-hospital, non-drug treatment model for newly identified acutely psychotic persons.
Schizophrenia Bulletin is a peer-reviewed medical journal which covers research relating to the etiology and treatment of schizophrenia. The journal is published bimonthly by Oxford University Press in association with the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center and Schizophrenia International Research Society.
Frederick King Goodwin is an American psychiatrist and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the George Washington University Medical Center, where he is also director of the Center on Neuroscience, Medical Progress, and Society. He is a specialist in bipolar disorder and recurrent depression.
David Franklin is an American microbiologist and former fellow of Harvard Medical School who while employed by Parke-Davis filed the 1996 whistleblower lawsuit exposing their illegal promotion of Neurontin (gabapentin) for off-label uses. Franklin's suit, filed on behalf of the citizens of the United States under the qui tam provisions of US federal and state law, uncovered illegal pharmaceutical industry practices and created new legal precedent that resulted in a cascade of criminal convictions and civil and criminal penalties against Pfizer and several other pharmaceutical companies totalling more than $7 billion. Civil cases also followed Franklin v. Parke-Davis. Insurance companies, led by Kaiser Permanente, sued Pfizer for fraud and violation of the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act; the Kaiser case settled in April 2014 after Pfizer's appeal at the US Supreme Court was rejected. Franklin v. Pfizer also spawned more than a thousand wrongful death (suicide) suits associated with use of Neurontin. Numerous books have addressed the social, economic and healthcare implications of Dr. Franklin's stance and actions. The settlement was the first off-label promotion settlement under the False Claims Act.
The Critical Psychiatry Network (CPN) is a psychiatric organization based in the United Kingdom. It was created by a group of British psychiatrists who met in Bradford, England in January 1999 in response to proposals by the British government to amend the 1983 Mental Health Act (MHA). They expressed concern about the implications of the proposed changes for human rights and the civil liberties of people with mental health illness. Most people associated with the group are practicing consultant psychiatrists in the United Kingdom's National Health Service (NHS), among them Dr Joanna Moncrieff. A number of non-consultant grade and trainee psychiatrists are also involved in the network.
Sir Simon Charles Wessely is a British psychiatrist. He is professor of psychological medicine at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London and head of its department of psychological medicine, vice dean for academic psychiatry, teaching and training at the Institute of Psychiatry, as well as Director of the King's Centre for Military Health Research. He is also honorary consultant psychiatrist at King's College Hospital and the Maudsley Hospital, as well as civilian consultant advisor in psychiatry to the British Army. He was knighted in the 2013 New Year Honours for services to military healthcare and to psychological medicine. From 2014 to 2017, he was the elected president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
Study 329 was a clinical trial conducted in North America from 1994 to 1998 to study the efficacy of paroxetine, an SSRI anti-depressant, in treating 12- to 18-year-olds diagnosed with major depressive disorder. Led by Martin Keller, then professor of psychiatry at Brown University, and funded by the British pharmaceutical company SmithKline Beecham—known since 2000 as GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)—the study compared paroxetine with imipramine, a tricyclic antidepressant, and placebo. SmithKline Beecham had released paroxetine in 1991, marketing it as Paxil in North America and Seroxat in the UK. The drug attracted sales of $11.7 billion in the United States alone from 1997 to 2006, including $2.12 billion in 2002, the year before it lost its patent.
As long as psychiatry has existed it has been subject to controversy. Psychiatric treatments are sometimes seen to be ultimately more damaging than helpful to patients. Psychiatry is sometimes thought to be a benign medical practice, but at times is seen by some as a coercive instrument of oppression. Psychiatry is seen to involve an unequal power relationship between doctor and patient, and critics of psychiatry claim a subjective diagnostic process, leaving much room for opinions and interpretations. In 2013, psychiatrist Allen Frances said that "psychiatric diagnosis still relies exclusively on fallible subjective judgments rather than objective biological tests". Every society permits compulsory treatment of mental patients.
Kathleen Slattery-Moschkau is an American filmmaker, yoga instructor, and former pharmaceutical sales representative. She is known for writing, directing, and co-producing the 2005 satirical film Side Effects. As of 2013, she was the owner of "the Studio", a yoga studio in Madison, Wisconsin.
Dan Markingson was a young man from St. Paul, Minnesota who committed suicide in an ethically controversial psychiatric research study at the University of Minnesota while under an involuntary commitment order. For nearly eleven years, University of Minnesota officials defended the conduct of its researchers, despite significant public criticism, numerous news reports, and pressure for an external investigation. In March 2015, however, an investigation by a state watchdog agency found a number of alarming ethical violations in the case, including serious conflicts of interest and financial incentives, poor oversight of the study, pressure on Markingson to join the study while he was in a highly vulnerable state, and a series of misleading public statements by university officials. Shortly afterwards, the university suspended recruitment into psychiatric research studies. On April 9, 2015, Charles Schulz, MD, announced his resignation as Chair of the Department of Psychiatry.
Steven Stack is an American sociologist and professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at Wayne State University, where he is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neuroscience. He is known for his research on suicide prevention, including on the effects of media coverage of suicides on copycat suicides. He has also researched other forms of violence, including homicide and murder-suicide.
