Leonard Roy Frank has published an excellent commentary on a recent article by Dr. Thomas Szasz on Barely a Blog: Read it here.

Added: Jan 11, 2007 5:49 pm | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

Pact gives mentally ill options Patients decide which treatments they would allow October 16, 2006 BY JIM RITTER Health Reporter Chicago Sun Times If you're hospitalized and unable to make health decisions, a living will can guide doctors about how much medical intervention you want.But what if you have a mental breakdown? A similar document, called a psychiatric advance directive, details the mental health treatments you would prefer. Psychiatric advance directives, or PADs, have been available for years, and Illinois' document is among the best, experts say. But PADs are little known and seldom ... (more...)

Added: Oct 23, 2006 2:29 pm | 1 Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

The Scotsman Oct. 8, 2006 KATE FOSTER CHIEF REPORTER (kfoster@scotlandonsunday.com) DOZENS of psychiatric patients were given electric shock treatment without their consent in Scottish hospitals last year despite huge controversy over the safety of the treatment. Almost 10% of patients given electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) underwent the procedure as a compulsory treatment for severe depression, according to figures seen by Scotland on Sunday. Last night doctors revealed some patients are forcibly held down and anaesthetised for the procedure, prompting grave concerns from mental health campaigners who warn that its side-effects include confusion, headaches and long-term memory loss. But psychiatrists insist ECT can help some patients with severe depression for whom medication is not working. An audit of Scottish hospitals in 2005 by the Scottish ECT Accreditation Network reveals ... (more...)

Added: Oct 9, 2006 9:43 pm | 2 Comments |  Email This Post  | Print

350 former psychiatric patients to seek compensation from government Oct. 6 2006 New Zealand Radio The lawyer for 350 former psychiatric patients seeking compensation from the government says there's no difference between his clients and another set of patients who have already been paid substantial compensation. The 350 claim they were mistreated at State-run mental asylums in the 1960s and 70s. Their accounts of abuse are similar to those of former patients at the Lake Alice psychiatric hospital, who are sharing $6.5 million in compensation paid in 2001. About 200 of the group have already lodged legal claims; and more are expected to do so, saying they suffered physical and sexual abuse. They also say electric shock treatment was used as a punishment. Govt stance The new group's ... (more...)

Added: Oct 5, 2006 5:49 pm | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

M E M O R A N D U M September 21, 2006 A New York State intermediate appellate court, the Appellate Division, Second Judicial Department, has rejected a challenge by MHLS to a lower court order authorizing involuntary electro-shock treatment of Simone D., a patient at Creedmoor Psychiatric Center, a state hospital in Queens, New York. The Appellate Division, in its 3-to-2 September 19, 2006 decision, Matter of Simone D. (Anonymous), affirmed the lower court, with a strong dissent by two justices. The trial court's order had authorized the administration of up to 30 shock treatments over a period of six months, with the frequency to be determined by the hospital's "ECT team." Simone D. previously had been given at least 148 shock treatments over her objection by Creedmoor under ... (more...)

Added: Sep 26, 2006 11:06 am | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

[*1] In the Matter of Simone D. (Anonymous), appellant; Kathleen Iverson, etc., respondent. 2005-11405, (Index No. 501166/05) SUPREME COURT OF NEW YORK, APPELLATE DIVISION, SECOND DEPARTMENT 2006 NY Slip Op 6574; 2006 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 10885 September 19, 2006, Decided THIS OPINION IS UNCORRECTED AND SUBJECT TO REVISION BEFORE PUBLICATION IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS. COUNSEL: Mental Hygiene Legal Service, Mineola, N.Y. (Kim L. Darrow and Dennis B. Feld of counsel), for appellant. Eliot Spitzer, Attorney-General, New York, N.Y. (Michael S. Belohlavek and Patrick J. Walsh of counsel), for respondent. JUDGES: STEPHEN G. CRANE, J.P., DAVID S. RITTER, GLORIA GOLDSTEIN, REINALDO E. RIVERA, MARK C. DILLON, JJ. RITTER, RIVERA and DILLON, JJ., concur. CRANE, J.P., dissents with memorandum, in which GOLDSTEIN, J., concurs. OPINION: DECISION & ORDER In a proceeding ... (more...)

Added: Sep 26, 2006 10:56 am | 2 Comments |  Email This Post  | Print

Full report, released September 15, 2006 http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/m-news+article+storyid-16220.html Excerpts: In December 2005 a Beijing attorney sent an open letter to President Hu Jintao highlighting abuses of Falun Gong practitioners. The letter described the electric shock torture of Zhang Zhikui, a Falun Gong practitioner arrested for repeated petitioning in Beijing, and the October beating death in Changchun, Jilin Province of Liu Boyang and his mother Wang Shouhui. The letter, and a similar open letter sent by the attorney in 2004, referred to the extra-legal activities of the 610 office, reportedly involved in many of the abuses of Falun Gong. In 2005 the Government revoked the attorney's license to practice law, and the attorney has ... (more...)

Added: Sep 17, 2006 11:38 am | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

Details from the report on ECT use in Turkey, from CPT: Full report: http://www.cpt.coe.int/documents/tur/2006-30-inf-eng.htm C.        ECT and other psychiatry-related issues 1.         Preliminary remarks 58.       As already mentioned, one of the issues focussed on during the December 2005 ad hoc visit were the procedures for the administration of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) in psychiatric establishments. This subject had been addressed in some detail in the report on the 1997 visit to Turkey (cf. CPT/Inf (99) 2, paragraphs 178 to 182). However, information recently received from various sources indicated that certain of the CPT’s recommendations had not yet been implemented, in particular as regards the discontinuance of the practice of unmodified ECT.  For the purpose of examining this question, the CPT’s delegation visited two State hospitals, Bakırköy Mental ... (more...)

Added: Sep 6, 2006 9:42 pm | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

The Council of Europe's Committee for the prevention of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment (CPT) has published today the report on its most recent visit to Turkey, in December 2005, together with the response of the Turkish Government. These documents have been made public at the request of the Turkish authorities. During the December 2005 ad hoc visit, the CPT's delegation reviewed the situation in practice as regards the treatment of persons held by the law enforcement agencies (police and gendarmerie) and assessed the day-to-day operation of the legal safeguards against ill-treatment currently in force. Attention was also given to developments in F-type (high-security) Prisons, in particular as regards communal activities for inmates and the regime applied to ... (more...)

Added: Sep 6, 2006 9:31 pm | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

Chris Bond Yorkshire Post Today August 24, 2006 Grandmother tortured by Chinese – all for her beliefs Falun Gong is a spiritual movement that once had nearly 100 million followers in China. But since it was banned by the government, thousands of practitioners have been tortured and even killed. ZHEN is perched on the edge of the sofa. If she sits back you fear her tiny frame may be swallowed up completely. Listening to the softly-spoken grandmother it is difficult to comprehend how anyone could bring themselves to harm her – but they have. The 66-year-old claims she's been beaten, force fed and suffered electro-shock therapy at the hands of the Chinese police – all because of her beliefs. Zhen is one of the lucky ones, though, she's ... (more...)

Added: Aug 24, 2006 3:53 pm | 3 Comments |  Email This Post  | Print

19 August 2006 By GEOFF TAYLOR stuff.co.nz An opponent wants to stop shock treatment for the mentally ill, but medical experts believe it has positive results. Geoff Taylor reports. More than one in four people at Waikato Hospital who get electric shock treatment do not consent. One opponent calls the statistic barbaric, but medical staff say her views are based on out-dated ideas of the treatment. They say electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) is performed under general anaesthetic and allows many mentally ill people to live normal lives. Hamilton patients rights advocate Anna de Jonge wants all ECT stopped. Health Ministry statistics show that in the 2004-05 year 93 non-consented treatments were given to patients at Waikato Hospital. This amounted to 30 per cent of all treatments. Nationally, 23 per cent ... (more...)

Added: Aug 20, 2006 12:43 am | 2 Comments |  Email This Post  | Print

Dr. Bonnie Burstow explores electroshock as a form of violence against women. She is a feminist therapist, an anti-psychiatry and anti-fascist activist. She is also the former co-chiar of the Ontario Coalition Against Electroshock and is the author of Radical Feminist Therapy: Working in the Context of Violence. Two versions: An edited version runs just under 30 minutes and the full speech runs just over 60 minutes. Listen to an edited version (30 min) or full speech (60 min)

Added: Aug 18, 2006 11:15 am | 1 Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

Shocks given without consent 15 August 2006 By KIM RUSCOE Stuff.co.nz About 130 people have been given shock treatment without their consent in the past two years, a Health Ministry report shows. Mental Health deputy director Jeremy Skipworth said that, of the 612 severely depressed patients who received electroconvulsive therapy between mid-2003 and mid-2005, only 80 per cent consented. Two-thirds of those treated were women, most aged over 40. "Sometimes people are so unwell they are not actually able to give consent," Dr Skipworth said. "It's not appropriate for them to be deprived of the ability to be treated just because they're so sick they can't agree to it." Those people were committed under the Mental Health Act and given shock treatment after a second opinion had been given ... (more...)

Added: Aug 14, 2006 10:51 pm | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print

Robert Pirsig: Still Zen after all these years Author's 500-page novel Lila about to be reissued He defined an era with Motorcycle memoir in 1974 Aug. 12, 2006 JOHN FREEMAN Toronto Star Robert Pirsig has a bone to pick with philosophers. As his era-defining memoir Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance levitated up the bestseller lists in 1974, all he heard from them was grumbling. This story of a father-son motorcycle trip across America was just a skeleton of a philosophy, they said. What exactly was this "metaphysics of quality" he kept talking about? And who was he to tell them about it? Seventeen years later Pirsig gave his answer and it came in the form of a 500-page novel, Lila: An Inquiry ... (more...)

Added: Aug 12, 2006 5:18 pm | 2 Comments |  Email This Post  | Print

NoForce Activists --  The following is a scanned copy of a ECT certified court order that was filed in Hennepin County District Court on Sept. 16, 2002.  I pass this along for informational purposes with permission from the Respondent who requested that her name and month/day of her birth remain annonymous.  The Respondent's desire is to let all concerned about forced psychiatric treatment see for yourselves what is happening in Minnesota. At this moment I am not aware that this file has been sealed.  When I called Hennepin County Mental Health Court at 2:14 PM (CDT) to inquire about the status of a "Motion To Stay Entry of Judgment and Ammended Findings Of Fact" that the Respondent's attorney told me she on September 17, 2002, the clerk told me that ... (more...)

Added: Jul 29, 2006 12:13 am | Comment |  Email This Post  | Print