Portal:Psychiatry/Selected article/10

Vienna's Narrenturm — German for "fools' tower" — was one of the earliest buildings specifically designed as a "madhouse". It was built in 1784.

Anti-psychiatry has been active for almost two centuries, and is the view that many psychiatric treatments are ultimately more damaging than helpful to patients. Psychiatry is seen by proponents of anti-psychiatry as a coercive instrument of oppression. According to anti-psychiatry, psychiatry involves an unequal power relationship between doctor and patient, and a highly subjective diagnostic process, leaving too much room for opinions and interpretations.

Anti-psychiatry originates in an objection to what some view as dangerous treatments. Examples include electroconvulsive therapy, insulin shock therapy, brain lobotomy, and the over-prescription of potentially dangerous pharmaceutical drugs. An immediate concern lies in the significant increase in prescribing psychiatric drugs for children. There were also concerns about mental health institutions. Every society, including liberal Western society, permits involuntary treatment or involuntary commitment of mental patients. (Full article...)