It is now fifty years since I started working at the Brook Hospital in Woolwich, and more than forty years since I picked up my Springfield Hospital pager on my first day as a psychiatric trainee. I have done a lot of different things as a psychiatrist. Amongst them, I am most proud of what […]
Archive | Psychiatry
Glenburnie Gate
By Catherine Robinson on 28th October 2024 in Junior Doctors, Life, Medicine, Mental Health, Psychiatry
Pre-registration house jobs were supposed to comprise twelve months working under close supervision whilst a decision was made whether the doctor should be allowed to work as an autonomous medical practitioner. In practice, it was unheard of that anyone should fail to move from provisional to full registration. My house jobs were due to end […]
Psychiatric Epiphany Part 3: The winter of discontent
By Catherine Robinson on 19th February 2022 in 1970s, Medical School, Mental Health, Psychiatry, Uncategorised
Having decided to become a psychiatrist, I watched the autumn of 1978 fade into the notorious Winter of Discontent, the prelude to Margaret Thatcher’s first election victory. Leaving aside public sector strikes and severe cold weather, rather a lot of significant events in my life happened in the last three months of 1978. My long […]
Psychiatric Epiphany part 2: Formerly Surrey County Asylum
By Catherine Robinson on 17th January 2022 in 1970s, Hospitals, Medical School, Mental Health, Psychiatry
My wife has a habit of forgetting to tell me things. When she was at university, she neglected to tell me that her parents would be moving house before she came home for the holidays and I only found out by accident. She denies that this was an attempt to dump me and says she […]
Psychiatric Epiphany Part 1: Walking to Dartford Heath
By Catherine Robinson on 8th January 2022 in 1970s, History, Medical School, Mental Health, Psychiatry
When I was growing up, Bexley Hospital was the psychiatric facility for our part of London. “You belong in Bexley, you do!” was a regular childhood taunt. In 1968, when I was 12, my Auntie Peg was admitted to Bexley Hospital, where she was given a course of ECT and she was started on the […]
“I’ve had such a curious dream” said Alice
On Monday, I was presented with an award by Alistair Campbell, who himself was given an award in the same ceremony. As it was all over my Twitter feed for a few hours (and has attracted some light trolling), I might as well acknowledge it. At present, there is a banner photo at the top […]
One step forward, two steps back
I was never entirely sure about my mother’s attitude to religion, as she often criticised my father for being too dogmatic in his atheism. When she was dying, I asked her if she wanted any religious element in her funeral. “Of course I don’t!” she snapped back, “what would I want that for?” Then she […]
The flame still flickers
I have had a good idea. Let’s acknowledge that the functionalised system of care in mental health was never a clearly articulated policy, that it was never based on proper evidence, that most patients and professionals dislike it and that it does not work. Let’s abandon it. All we have to do is to agree […]
Dancing about psychiatry
No one knows who first said that writing about music is like dancing about architecture, but dancing about psychiatry certainly does not seem to work. Stigma can be conveyed without the use of words. On Friday, I attended a really enjoyable party in honour of Vanessa Cameron, who leaves the Royal College of Psychiatrist at […]
The virtual asylum revisited
Early in my career as a consultant, I took responsibility for the psychiatric care of a group of men who had been resettled in a community facility after decades as residents in a distant mental hospital. One man sticks in my mind. Ernie had diagnoses of learning disability and chronic schizophrenia. He was mute. He […]