Talk Doesn’t Pay

Talk Doesn’t Pay, So Psychiatry Turns to Drug Therapy is so tragic for all concerned. I can't imagine what it must be like to go into psychiatry to do real work with patients and end up extruding people through a pipe. This isn't good for patients, obviously, and not for the psychiatrists.

Comments

  1. I read it too! Stop the drugs and start the therapy!

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  2. This has been the case in the UK for decades. I've never come across a psychiatrist who attempts any form of therapy, they are just highly qualified pharmacists. I have unfortunately been the bane of all my previous psychiatrists' lives, because antidepressants make me suicidal and/or manic and I can't take antipsychotics or mood stabilisers because I have such intense physical side effects. As a result, the services never know what the heck to do with me - talk therapy being limited and drug therapy being limitless. I've not seen a psychiatrist for years now...

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  3. We have been lucky enough to come across a psychiatrist in ny, Dr Jeffrey DeSarbo who definitely breaks that mold. Of course, he prescribes meds when needed but concentrates on his connection and therapy with his patients. He is very well educated in the current evidenced based treatments and we feel lucky to have him. I do believe he is a needle in a haystack. My experiences with other psychiatrist was so dismal, they even have the audacity to make and treat diagnosis with one or two visits. Such a dangerous practice in my opinion..

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  4. Psychiatry and therapy should not be an either or - in fact, when it is I wonder if either can be sufficient.

    It's tragic.

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  5. Psychiatrists can choose to earn less money and not do only diagnosis and medication management, but it's hard to turn down that extra money. It is possible that as this situation becomes well-known, people who are considering going to med school to become psychiatrists and don't want to have to choose between money and really knowing/helping their patients beyond the few questions they ask before they write the prescription, will choose a different path.

    All other mental health professionals, including psychologists don't have this choice as they are not able to prescribe medications. So sufferers who need medication and therapy must go to two professionals. It's a difficult, expensive system for those with mental illness to negotiate, not to mention dealing with problems with insurance coverage and expense.

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  6. Yes, this is an enfuriating and cynical development in the world of psychiatry. As if the whole history of parent-blaming, repressed sexual urges stuff were not bad enough, now comes this!

    When I send patients to psychiatrists or psychiatric nurse practitioners, what the patient gets, after the initial visit, is a "medication management" 30 minute visit and a "see you in a month." A month??!! A child is put on a psychoactive medication and she/he will see them in a month? How about laboratory studies to monitor side-effects, how about parent supervised administration of medication, how about feed-back from the family and child since brain-altering medication was given?

    It's about money. Of course it is.

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