Discussion How can psychiatrists do better?

[lamargue]

How have psychiatrists wronged you and, in general, what can they do better? What is an optimal psychiatrist?

 

[pilotviolin]

holistic approach and maybe giving a shit

 

[lamargue]

holistic approach and maybe giving a shit

Wdym by a holistic approach?

 

[pilotviolin]

Wdym by a holistic approach?

seeing the patient as a whole person with different things going on in their life outside of meds to make a more informed decision also they should listen and believe us more and not just gaslight us about medication (eg. refusing to acknowledge you are having issues with a medication)

 

[lamargue]

seeing the patient as a whole person with different things going on in their life outside of meds to make a more informed decision also they should listen and believe us more and not just gaslight us about medication (eg. refusing to acknowledge you are having issues with a medication)

yeah, it's pretty common to find psychiatrists that view mental illnesses like diseases, in that they are purely material in nature. what Laing called a false epistemology. pretty unfortunate

 

[Hollowman]

There are no optimal psychiatrists and never will be. They could do better by retiring and getting real jobs. Or they could come here and find a reliable method and die. Fuck them!

 

[thenamingofcats]

- Make diagnosing an ongoing process instead of an event. There should always be room for revision of the dx.
- Seeing the therapy as a collaboration instead of the doctor analyzing and treating the patient.
- More focus on the symptoms that are bothering the patient instead of trying to make them "normal"

 

[bluedream]

- Make diagnosing an ongoing process instead of an event. There should always be room for revision of the dx.
- Seeing the therapy as a collaboration instead of the doctor analyzing and treating the patient.
- More focus on the symptoms that are bothering the patient instead of trying to make them "normal"

this is the right answer. id like to add, that many of the issues in mental healthcare are more due to a flawed system of insurances limiting what psychiatrists can do, and how they can help the patient.

i think a lot of people also misunderstand what psychiatrists can do and their limits just as human beings. I see no sense in taking an anti-psychiatry position like a lot of members on here do, just because they havent fixed my mental illness. theres only so much they can do, im not gonna blame a doctor who puts in effort for my brain being borked.

 

[Lady Laudanum]

By not booty juicing me with haldol lmao

 

[Dusk till dawn]

They can stop all the unnecessary unwanted toxic positivity and useless delusional motivational speeches and just prescribe some real useful shit instead of SSRIs that clearly doesn't work, such as morphine, xanax, overall things that works and will relieve your pain, i'd consider going to therapists if they didn't try to intoxicate me with their toxic positivity and did prescribe something efficient at curing my depression such as xanax and morphine instead of prescribing ineffective weak SSRIs, i would also like if they can keep your secrets as secrets and not report you if you admit you are suicidal, overall a more pro-choice approach without toxic positivity and prescribing efficient medicines such as xanax and opiods instead of the usual typical SSRIs would improve people's mental health

 

[Dr Iron Arc]

They need to start experimenting on alternate universe versions of their patients until they eventually find the exact perfect cocktail of drugs that's going to magically fix every single thing wrong on the first try and have zero side effects. Until they do that, the field is basically just a pseudoscience because they can't possibly properly apply the scientific method to any treatments without treating individuals as all being the same sample which just isn't correct.

 

[DeIetedUser4739]

If any of the Psychiatrists i saw in the Hospital had said look I think you're experiencing Psychosis, are you hearing voices or seeing things I would've known I wasn't talking to God /spirits. Even if they just had posters on the walls of what Psychosis was with symptoms listed it would have woke me up.

Instead they just berated me, asking about what school was like and if I liked certain foods. They then got the nurses to inject me with shit against my will and sent me home, I only found out I was there because of suspected psychosis when I read the discharge form at home.

 

[ForgottenAgain]

- Taking a good damn history right
- Admiting when they have no clue what my issue is
- Not using contradictory statements like "you're not psychotic", "you had psychotic episodes", "sounds like psychosis", "it's not psychosis"
- Listening to me before interrupting for the 99999th time
- Caring about the symptoms I'm concerned about instead of interrupting and just asking "okay but do you still want to die?"
- Not being so trigger happy about prescribing meds before figuring out what my diagnosis is to begin with
- Having 1 drop of empathy

 

[leavingthesoultrap]

They could stop branding every other woman with bdp and learn more about cptsd and level one autism.

 

[Angst Filled Fuck Up]

Create an open environment which is non-threatening and operates on the premise of what the patient can comfortably tolerate, then formulate a treatment plan with those parameters in mind. Learn the type of feedback and constructive criticism that the individual responds best to (ask them directly). Ask about the patient's comfort level as it pertains to medication and what they'd be willing to try. Above all, ensure the patient retains their autonomy (the only exceptions would be if they're homocidal or on drugs) and make it clear they're free to leave at any time. Stick to appointments, and don't gaslight or duck out on a patient, especially in a crisis situation or where reasonable progress is being made. Have a third party supervise the sessions to ensure no abuse or misuse of power is going on.

 

[ColorlessTrees]

Wronged me all three times I've given in by the following: as a child, telling my parents to put a lock on my door at night, because I was "acting out" while I was struggling from staff abuse at school; when I was dragged to a different one, once again as a slightly older child, berated and yelled at for being mute/anxious, told I was "refusing to speak" and "just being stubborn" despite this being a lifelong thing; bullied in the ward against my medical rights to not take antipsychotics(?), and finally, most recently as an adult, explaining my issues in context and being questioned as if I'm bipolar (not the case), then having them do nothing until they speak to my therapist, claim they "couldn't get in contact" after I gave them the info, then ghosting me before further treatment. This was expensive and out of pocket. Another appointment to begin with would've been 425$. And this was a super highly rated one. I'm finished with their bullshit.

They could do better by realizing their limits, having some humility and empathy, and not looking to SSRIs as the gold standard/then random cocktails of meds and praying you come out all right. In the US, not putting money before the patient. Not abusing their power, making harmful blanket assumptions when they haven't got a clue, and of course if you have leads, you're just some sick freak who doesn't know anything in comparison to their godlike status as a psuedodoc.

I'm not fully antipsychiatry contrary to my unhinged rant, but I think it's primitive and unsafe the way it currently stands and I will never touch it again. Great for the lucky few who it's helped, but the brief time I was on lexapro was one of the worst experiences of my life. And I'm far from the only one who has been harmed by it.

Most of my mental health issues stem from health & environmental factors. I don't need every one of my oddities to be pathologized.

 

[Cinnamorolls]

Be willing to listen to which medications patients want to try and open to prescribing it. As opposed to pushing SSRI/SNRIs only and insisting that those are the only things that work. The success rates for SSRI/SNRIs is actually quite low (~40%) which makes this even more ridiculous.

And not being hostile or insulting towards patients. No excuse for that.

 

[Someone123]

Mst of what they do is very damaging at great profit, exploiting the mnost vulnerable- the medications cause lts of damage and almost never help, I think with schizophrenia though medications help, but that is a tiny frraction of their patients. Antidepressants cause so much damage and only seem to help in rare cases, and even in these cases it could be explained possibly by a placebo effect. Psycholigists can help if they honestly care, but their processes are very slow to get results in most cases, the system hee is not designed to get faster results, which it should be and could be.