Peer review in Kingsland

This month's Peer Review meeting was held tonight in Kingsland. Each month (more or less) we take turns to host the group at a restaurant of our choice. We are at one and the same time both a disparate group (we do not work in the same service) and a very cohesive group, in that we share broadly similar views of what can and should be the role of psychiatrists. Two of us have spent the great majority of our working life in acute inpatient settings, and the other four have never shirked this difficult area, while often working elsewhere. All of us recognise that social and economic issues beyond the influence of mere clinicians, drive  much of what is too glibly called mental disorder. Glibly, because DSM has established diagnoses on the basis of satisfying a certain number of factors, without needing to understand what might cause a person to react in a particular way. Indeed, DSM is almost proudly disinterested in causes. 

Tonight, amongst other more typical peer review discussions, we considered whether or not we might have a role in demanding a fresh look at what is afflicting especially young people in the economically developed so-called western world. Where structures alienate, disenfranchise, and blame a large proportion of the populace.

We are condemned by caring, to live in interesting times.