Psycho-ramblers go rambling

A journalist in the Boston Globe, has written what can only be described as poetry to those who recognise the idiocy of psychiatry. 'So who's crazy now?' considers all of the psycho-ramblers [psychiatrists] and their psycho-ramblings ['disorders'] who periodically come together to form the comic known as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).

And I thought I was needed to trivialise psychiatry. In an editorial published in Psychiatric Times, Dr. Allen Frances, the editor of DSM-IV, called DSM-V "a wholesale imperial medicalization of normality that will trivialize mental disorder and lead to a deluge of unneeded medication treatment - a bonanza for the pharmaceutical industry but at a huge cost to the new false positive 'patients' caught in the excessively wide DSM-V net." Exactly doc.

And psychiatrist, Dr Daniel Carlat, has described the rambling process on his blog, the Carlat Psychiatry Blog, as a 'Bar Room Brawl'. He says, "There can be no dramatic improvements in psychiatric diagnosis until we make a fundamental leap in our understanding of what causes mental disorders. The incredible recent advances in neuroscience, molecular biology, and brain imaging that have taught us so much about normal brain functioning are still not relevant to the clinical practicalities of everyday psychiatric diagnosis. The clearest evidence supporting this disappointing fact is that not even one biological test is ready for inclusion in the criteria sets for DSM-5."

What? No biological test ready? Surely not.

My tongue, by the way, is once again firmly planted in my cheek.

Who wants the job of top dog at Broadmoor?

If people detained in Broadmoor Hospital die at the hands of another person who's also detained in the hospital, it's a situation where the only answer is to put each of the people into solitary. That'd solve it. How else d'you prevent a detainee from killing another detainee especially when those in question have demonstrated their willingness to take another's life?

I'm writing this after reading the report in the Times about the Chief Executive of Broadmoor Hospital, Mr Simon Crawford, who has jumped ship prior to a report expected to criticise the hospital management following "serious untoward incidents" where detainees have been murdered or have committed suicide. Mr Crawford has reportedly taken up a new position in NHS London.

It said of Mr Crawford’s move: “Discussions have taken place between Simon Crawford and the trust and they both agreed that the time was right for Simon to move on ...” The right time to moveon? I don't think so. How about sticking around and facing up to the failures like a good manager? I guess that's not what managers do these days. Now they leave with their big pensions.

When the report is finally made public, I anticipate the result will be: the hospital can "learn valuable lessons" from the report, and it will be resolute in "implementing the recommendations" and it will say sorry to the family of the deceased. Then it will attempt to carry on in the hope it can attract more employees who haven't read the papers, who haven't listened to the radio or haven't watched the telly. How about doing something different as what's been going on there obviously hasn't worked.

Murder isn't murder according to one psychiatrist

When psychiatrists tamper with stuff they think they know about, we're in trouble. Most people go along with the docs when they start talking shop about people's state of mind, because most people don't stand back and really listen to what they're saying.

The latest tampering is to do with the Stockwell Strangler Kenneth Erskine, who's had his convictions for murder reduced to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility, because a psychiatrist said he was suffering from an 'abnormality' of the mind at the time of the killings.

The tampering psychiatrist is Dr Andrew Horne from notorious Broadmoor. So doc, how d'you know that then? How d'you know Erskine had an 'abnormality' of the mind? Rhetorical question because the truth of the matter is you don't know. You just made it up.

Banned for life from working as a nurse

Psychiatric nurse Joanne Holmes has been struck off of the nursing register by the Nursing and Midwifery Council and banned for life from working as a nurse after shenanigans with a man who was a prisoner under her care.

The Emperor's wardrobe is overflowing with new suits

I didn't want to let the internet addiction story just sail on by without taking a look at how it's determined whether me and you have an 'addiction'. I typed in 'internet addiction' and got a page that gave a test, a bit of self-diagnosis by the looks of it. I didn't want to go there; I might get a shock, at least that's what's supposed to happen.

Instead I went to find who the top bod is who's pushing this stuff. I found a Dr Kimberly Young, "...an internationally known expert on Internet addiction and online behaviour." By the way, no idea what makes her an 'expert' on this. But I noticed she wrote a paper, Drug Treatment for Internet Addiction. So this means you can take drugs to overcome the desire to log on, or to visit a web site or any other internet activity. I really don't buy this rubbish.

The usual stuff then. Behaviour that seems to be a bit odd, call it something, and drug it. Oh, and make a bucket load of cash in the process by going around talking about it.

I think the Emperor's wardrobe is overflowing with new suits.

Alternatives to shock treatment

Instead of the Cuckoo's Nest method of frying someone's brain for 'internet addiction', I've put together a few alternatives that may be of assistance to those in need of something less stimulating to resolve the problem of being on the Internet for a bit too long:

1) Go to the electrical outlet socket and pull the plug out
2) Turn the computer off and give the computer to another person
3) Ask the telecommunications provider to cut the phone line
4) Take the wifi card out of your computer and throw it away
5) For more up-to-date computers, disable the in-built wifi capability
6) Do something else in your spare time
7) Don't talk to shrinks

There now. These alternatives will work by the way.

I've been 'jolted' into literary action

I've been 'jolted' into literary action again by a story that 'shocked' me.

Here we are, blogging, tweeting, googling, facebooking, beboing, whatevering on our computers, and the shrinks come along and spoil all the fun. I wrote about 'internet addiction' on this blog in March last year when Dr Jerald Block, a shrink based in Portland, Oregon said we should recognise that we're clinically disordered if we're involved in "Excessive gaming, viewing online pornography, emailing and text messaging..." Wonder if the doc's trying to tell us something about himself?

Anyway, the Guardian has now reported shock treatment for 'internet addiction' has been banned in China. Now, just a minute, who the hell allowed shock treatment for this load of mumbo-jumbo in the first place? Someone at the ministry of health in China obviously fell for doc Block's waffle.

The idea of shock treatment is bad enough, but when it's administered, at cost, for a load of shrinking hot air, bloggers, tweeters, googlers, facebookers, beboers and whatevers should blog, tweet, and whatever and denounce the killjoys who it seems are making a bunch of cash frying people's brains.