A case study of institutional corruption -- Psychiatry adopts a disease model -- Economies of influence -- The etiology of mental illness is now known -- Psychiatry's new drugs -- Expanding the market -- Protecting the market -- The end product : clinical practice guidelines -- A society harmed -- Putting psychiatry on the couch -- Prescriptions for reform
Summary
Psychiatry Under the Influence investigates how the influence of pharmaceutical money and guild interests has corrupted the behavior of the American Psychiatric Association and academic psychiatry during the past 35 years. The book documents how the psychiatric establishment regularly misled the American public about what was known about the biology of mental disorders, the validity of psychiatric diagnoses, and the safety and efficacy of its drugs. It also looks at how these two corrupting influences encouraged the expansion of diagnostic boundaries and the creation of biased clinical practice guidelines. This corruption has led to significant social injury, and in particular, a societal lack of informed consent regarding the use of psychiatric drugs, and the pathologizing of normal behaviors in children and adults. The authors argues that reforming psychiatry will require the neutralization of these two corrupting influences--pharmaceutical money and guild interests--and the establishment of multidisciplinary authority over the field of mental health
