Mental health providers love hearing positive stories about how someone has struggled with their mental health, recovered, and will for ever be thankful for the wonderful help they received from caring staff. Some meetings start with a story others end with one. This is supposed to be ‘motivational’ for the staff, and good public relations too. What I learned over my career as an NHS psychiatrist, with my own lived experience of mental illness – recurrent depression – is that there are some things that staff and dignitaries attending such meetings do not want to hear about.

Towards a feminist psychiatry

Towards a feminist psychiatry

In this guest blog, Engender member Linda Gask explores the need for a coordinated approach to women’s physical and mental health.

In this guest blog, Engender member Linda Gask explores the need for a coordinated approach to women’s physical and mental health.

This International Women’s Day, we’re pleased to share a blog by Linda Gask reflecting on why we need a more gender‑informed approach to suicide prevention

The late queen can be held responsible for much, but nobody could accuse her of seeming to enjoy her role. For the...

‘You can cheat to get a paper. You can cheat to get a degree.  You can cheat to get a grant. You can’t cheat to cure a disease, biology doesn’t care.’  Professor Matthew Schrag, Vand…

‘You can cheat to get a paper. You can cheat to get a degree.  You can cheat to get a grant. You can’t cheat to cure a disease, biology doesn’t care.’  Professor Matthew Schrag, Vand…

Forced-birth groups are testing their strategy

‘Women’s centres should not be part of the criminal justice system.’ 'The idea that if something is painted pink and has the tagline of ‘empowering women’ then it is helping women, is not only harmful but is simplistic and dangerous.' So says Dr Gemma Ahearne from the University of Liverpool in her blog  The Problem with Women’s Centres…

The Reform leader was a teenager when he made crass remarks but we’re entitled to ask a would-be prime minister what lay behind them

‘Women’s centres should not be part of the criminal justice system.’ 'The idea that if something is painted pink and has the tagline of ‘empowering women’ then it is helping women, is not only harmful but is simplistic and dangerous.' So says Dr Gemma Ahearne from the University of Liverpool in her blog  The Problem with Women’s Centres…

The Institute of Mental Health is one of the leading mental health institutes in the UK, offering leadership and innovation backed by world class expertise.

Out of Her Mind: How We Are Failing Women’s Mental Health and What Must Change By Linda Gask. Cambridge University Press. 2024. £15.00 (hb). 312 pp. ISBN 978-1009382465 - Volume 227 Issue 6

My medical education, more than 40 years ago, was centred around the male body as the normative human being. As the American feminist and legal activist Catherine Mackinnon wrote only a few years later in Difference and Dominance: on sex discrimination: ‘A male body is the human body; all those extra things women have are studied in ob/gyn’. That was at a time when there was no imperative even to include women in randomised controlled trials of treatment, and they were excluded for many more years because the impact of their pesky hormonal fluctuations got in the way of standardising groups and making comparison between subjects.

My medical education, more than 40 years ago, was centred around the male body as the normative human being. As the American feminist and legal activist Catherine Mackinnon wrote only a few years later in Difference and Dominance: on sex discrimination: ‘A male body is the human body; all those extra things women have are studied in ob/gyn’. That was at a time when there was no imperative even to include women in randomised controlled trials of treatment, and they were excluded for many more years because the impact of their pesky hormonal fluctuations got in the way of standardising groups and making comparison between subjects.

The Institute of Mental Health is one of the leading mental health institutes in the UK, offering leadership and innovation backed by world class expertise.

There are times when traditional feminist thought does women no favours. In her recent ‘against the stream’ article ‘The Menopause transition, a call for a holistic approach’ Rachel Gibbons quotes from Germaine Greer – a heroine of mine in the 1970s: ‘ a view of menopause as a catastrophe […]. If women on the youthful side of climacteric could glimpse what this state of peaceful potency might be, the difficulty of this transition would be lessened.’

There are times when traditional feminist thought does women no favours. In her recent ‘against the stream’ article ‘The Menopause transition, a call for a holistic approach’ Rachel Gibbons quotes from Germaine Greer – a heroine of mine in the 1970s: ‘ a view of menopause as a catastrophe […]. If women on the youthful side of climacteric could glimpse what this state of peaceful potency might be, the difficulty of this transition would be lessened.’

Women demand harsher penalties for ‘God complex’ surgeons as a consultant, found by a tribunal to have harassed female colleagues for more than a decade,...

What’s that coming over the hill? A white, middle-class Englishman! A Lone Enraptured Male! From Cambridge! Here to...

It’s 35 years now since I first took antidepressants, and I’ve been on them continuously for 31, the last 25 years or so on an SNRI (Serotonin and Noradrenaline Reuptake Inhibitor)

It’s 35 years now since I first took antidepressants, and I’ve been on them continuously for 31, the last 25 years or so on an SNRI (Serotonin and Noradrenaline Reuptake Inhibitor)

The recent USA Food and Drug Administration (FDA) expert panel on the use of SSRIs in pregnancy, was a hard watch for various reasons, but, be assured, I’m not going to get into any discussion here about the risks of medication in pregnancy for reasons of my own sanity. No. My concerns were fourfold. The serious shortage of people with experience of actually caring for women with perinatal depression on the panel; the absence of evidence from anyone who has suffered, and I really stress that word…

The recent USA Food and Drug Administration (FDA) expert panel on the use of SSRIs in pregnancy, was a hard watch for various reasons, but, be assured, I’m not going to get into any discussion here about the risks of medication in pregnancy for reasons of my own sanity. No. My concerns were fourfold. The serious shortage of people with experience of actually caring for women with perinatal depression on the panel; the absence of evidence from anyone who has suffered, and I really stress that word…