Professor Bentall (Opinion, 26 February) writes well about the realities of mental disorders, but paints a less than complete picture of modern psychiatry. Psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, psychotherapists and other professionals work together for the benefit of patients. We share a common goal to improve the lives of those with mental ill health – indeed guidelines for treatment are decided by multidisciplinary teams. Some people do get better without medication, but there is a strong body of evidence that for many people, medication reduces the risk of relapse and harmful behaviour, and enables them to live full lives. While psychiatry is a medical speciality, we do not recognise the narrow biomedical approach that he suggests. In order to help the understanding, treatment and support of those with mental disorders, psychiatry brings together in equal measure the biological, psychological and social. Remove any one of these three, and I’m not sure what you would have, but it’s not psychiatry.
Professor Simon Wessely
President, Royal College of Psychiatrists
• It has been frustrating to see services which offer such therapeutic approaches suffer so many cuts on the NHS in recent years. Clearly, there is a role for medicine and shorter-term therapeutic interventions in the treatment of some people, but a way forward must be to acknowledge the need for many to voice their experience and story in a longer-term therapeutic relationship. With one in four people in the UK experiencing a mental health problem each year, how much longer can this country afford to treat mental ill health without looking at the wider socioeconomic causes that so often impact on life experiences?
Gary Fereday
Chief executive, British Psychoanalytic Council
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