> THE TEN WORST PUBLICATIONS IN THE HISTORY OF PSYCHIATRY

> 1 Ralph Rossen: Acute arrest of cerebral circulation in man,1943. An extreme
> experiment involving almost {*filter*} 100 prisoners and 11 chronic
> schizophrenics to test the effects of stopping {*filter*} flow to the brain.
> Scientifically dubious and ethically beyond the pale.

> 2 Valerie Sinason: Treating the Survivors of Satanic Abuse, 1994. Reopened
> controversy about ritual abuse of children. "Credulous, superstitious,
> iatrogenic illness-inducing , self-righteous, incendiary garbage,"a nomination
> read.

> 3 Luke Warm Luke {*filter*} inquiry, 1998: YInquiry into the killing of Susan
> Crawford, above, a mother of four and girlfriend of a schizophrenic patient,
> Michael Folkes, who stabbed her 70 times (he had changed his name to Luke Warm
> Luke). The high point of the blame culture and the stigmatisation of
> schizophrenics as random {*filter*}ers. One psychiatrist said: "It implied that
> whenever anything bad happened it was somebody's fault and these very rare
> events can be prevented. But they can't."

> 4 Rosenwald G C et al: "An action test of hypotheses concerning {*filter*}
> personality", Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1966. Subjects put hands in tubs
> of soil and slime; speed of action equated to personality. A psychiatrist said:
> "Shows how silly highly educated people can be."

> 4 Henry Miller: "Accident compensation neurosis", BMJ, 1961. Argued that people
> seeking compensation got better as soon as it was paid - shown since by much
> other research to be wrong. Hugely influential and still cited by neurologists
> in court cases.

> 6 The complete works of Sigmund Freud: 1880-1930. YNomination said: "His
> teaching led to the great psychodynamic movement with its tribalism and
> hostility to other models of mental illness and treatments. From this root we
> could select the mish-mash of persons e{*filter*}d about multiple personality
> disorders, {*filter*} trauma in infancy and other nonsense."

> 7 Egaz Moniz: Invention of psychosurgery. Portuguese diplomat, present at the
> First World War armistice, introduced the idea of brain surgery - the lobotomy
> - to cure mental disorder. A nomination read: "His efforts were useless; his
> work should have died an aborted death."

> 8 William Sargeant and Elliott Slater: An Introduction to Physical Treatments
> in Psychiatry, 1946. Advocated shock treatment, psychosurgery, and more.
> "Epitome of the mindless period of psychiatry during and after the war."

> 9 RD Laing: The Divided Self, 1960. Argued that it was not schizophrenics who
> were mad but society, and the cause lay within the family. "Hugely influential
> among the chattering classes": "Arrogant, infuriating, confusing philosophy for
> psychiatry... just plain wrong."

> 10 DSM-IV - Diagnostic and Statistical Manual: (4th ed). Containing every
> psychiatric diagnosis, it is criticised for reducing psychiatry to a checklist.
> "If you are not in DSM-IV you are not ill. It has become a monster, out of
> control."

> What Psychiatrists hate: (A Unique Poll)

> Among these: YRitual abuse legends, Multiple Personality theory, Repressed
> memories of childhood {*filter*} abuse trauma, YThe APA's DSM IV, Psychodynamics,
> Psychoanalysis, Shock treatment, Freud, Laing, Frontal lobotomy, {*filter*}
> personality tests.

> THE INDEPENDENT (London)
> March 19, 2001, Monday; Pg. 5

> TEN THINGS THAT DRIVE PSYCHIATRISTS TO DISTRACTION
> BY Jeremy Laurance Health Editor

> DOCTORS TEND to bury their mistakes but a group of the world's leading
> psychiatrists has chosen to dig them up and put them on display - in the hope
> of avoiding similar mistakes in the future.

> A unique poll of 200 specialists in mental health from around the globe has
> produced a selection of the worst publications in the history of their
> discipline.

> The results of the poll, carried out on the eve of the millennium 14 months
> ago, have been seen by The Independent. They show a psychiatric profession at
> the start of the 21st century throwing off the shackles of the past and
> dismissing some of the greatest names of the last century.

> Among the nominations for the worst research paper ever published were: Sigmund
> Freud, father of psychoanalysis, nominated for his complete works; R D Laing,
> leader of the 1960s anti-psychiatry movement, nominated for The Divided Self;
> and Egaz Moniz, inventor of psychosurgery (the frontal lobotomy) and one of
> only two psychiatrists to win the Nobel prize.

> The exercise, to mark the millennium, was partly tongue in cheek but partly
> intended to highlight where psychiatry had almost run off the rails. It shows
> psychiatrists dismissing the "shock 'em and slice 'em" brigade as well as
> challenging the psychoanalytic movement.

> "They show we are ruthless iconoclasts," said Simon Wessely, professor of
> psychiatry at King's College and the Maudsley Hospitals, south London, and
> organiser of the poll.

> The poll was followed by a meeting held at the Maudsley hospital attended by
> 150 psychiatrists at which a votes were cast to decide the ten worst papers of
> the millennium from over 100 nominations. The inclusion of Freud in the final
> list, at number six, was "slightly tongue in cheek" but also reflected the
> widespread view that despite having a major literary and cultural impact he had
> done nothing for patients, Professor Wessely said.

> R D Laing, the charismatic and influential psychiatrist who argued in the 1960s
> that it was not schizophrenics who were mad but society, was included for the
> harm his misguided theories had wreaked. "It was bad enough for parents having
> a child who was schizophrenic but being told it was their fault was even worse.
> It is true parents can influence the outcome of the illness but no one now
> thinks they are the cause," Professor Wessely said.

> Egaz Moniz, the most nominated individual in the poll, was shot dead by a
> disgruntled patient. The surgery he invented turned people into automatons and
> is now rarely performed. After winning the Nobel prize in 1949 he went on to
> write a history of playing cards.

> Professor Wessely said that the selection was "utterly unscientific" and that
> nominations from the Nazi era were excluded because they would have swept the
> board. YDespite that, research carried out in the name of psychiatry over the
> last century reached in some cases bizarre and disturbing limits.

> The accolade of worst research paper went to a brutal experiment carried out in
> the early 1940s. Scientists stopped the {*filter*} flow to the brain in 100
> prisoners and 11 chronic schizophrenics by pressing the carotid artery in their
> necks - to see what effect it would have.

> They measured the time before the unfortunate subjects lost consciousness and
> started fitting, observing in a paper published in Archives of Neurology and
> Psychiatry in 1943 that "no significant improvement in the psychiatric status
> of the schizophrenia patients was noted after repeated and relatively prolonged
> periods of arrest of cerebral circulation."

> Professor Wessely said: "Wasn't that a surprise? It was a worthy winner."

> > THE TEN WORST PUBLICATIONS IN THE HISTORY OF PSYCHIATRY

> > 1 Ralph Rossen: Acute arrest of cerebral circulation in man,1943. An
extreme
> > experiment involving almost {*filter*} 100 prisoners and 11 chronic
> > schizophrenics to test the effects of stopping {*filter*} flow to the brain.
> > Scientifically dubious and ethically beyond the pale.