DSM psychiatry manual's secrecy criticized
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is being revised under a cloak of confidentiality. Critics say the process needs to be open, and cite potential conflicts of interest.
By Ron Grossman
December 29, 2008
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mental-disorders29-2008dec29,0,3418306.story (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mental-disorders29-2008dec29,0,3418306.story)
Whether revisions to the bible of mental illness should be carried out in secret might seem like an academic question.
But the issue carries real weight for parents desperate to address children's difficult behavior or people in distress over their mental state. It also speaks to citizens' concerns over news accounts of an overmedicated America and of the troubling financial links between some psychiatric researchers and the pharmaceutical industry.
An update is underway for the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, known as the DSM, which defines the emotional problems for which doctors prescribe drugs and insurance companies pay the treatment bills. Psychiatrists working on the new edition were required to sign a strict confidentiality agreement.