Mental Health User Narratives

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xiii

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 1-5

3. Mental Illness and Psychiatry

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 6-31

4. Narratives

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 32-59

5. Crisis Intervention and Home Treatment

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 60-76

6. Methods

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 77-89

7. The User Narratives

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 90-131

8. Descent into Illness and Psychiatric Intervention

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 132-148

9. Recovery from Illness and Self-Coping

   • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

   Pages 149-164

10. Conclusion

    • Bruce M. Z. Cohen

    Pages 165-183

11. Back Matter

    Pages 184-211

    PDF

Following extensive research in the UK, Bruce Cohen allows mental health users to tell their own stories (or 'narratives') of illness and recovery. Institutional and home treatment care is covered alongside controversial self-coping techniques such as drug-taking, spiritualism, alternative healing, sleep and watching television.

• care
• coping
• crisis
• Institution
• intervention
• methods
• psychiatry
• television
• treatment

"Bruce Cohen offers innovative views about the value and impact of considering mental health services from users' perspectives." - British Journal of Psychology

"... very interesting, well researched and respectful of the service-user voice." - Psychiatric Bulletin

" an engaging critical study of the development and treatments of mental illnesses, which successfully demonstrates both the importance and relevance of social scientific approaches to the study of this area of medicine." - Medical Sociology Online

"In Mental Health User Narratives Cohen places the real experts on mental health problems centre stage. The subjective experience of people who use mental health services has been largely ignored, by researchers and clinicians, for as long as the 'medical model' has been dominant. This book provides a refreshing antidote to the bizarre notion that we can understand people's emotional pain by counting 'symptoms' and applying a diagnostic label. This is a must read for all involved in mental health services and research." -Professor John Read, University of Liverpool

• Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Germany

  Bruce M. Z. Cohen

BRUCE COHEN is a Research Fellow at Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany. He has previously researched mental health communities in Teesside and Bradford, publishing articles in the Psychiatric Bulletin and Science, Discourse and Mind. He has been awarded Research Scholarships to work in Australia and Germany, and is currently researching migrant youth in Berlin.

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