Methods

The recent advances selected are based on our clinical and academic interests. We identified the information presented from mainstream and specialist journals.

Combating the stigma of mental illness

Psychiatric stigmatisation is the inappropriate and erroneous association of mental illness with something disgraceful or shameful. Stigma generates a hidden burden and results in barriers to mental health care, reluctance to seek appropriate care, delay in return to wellbeing, and discrimination in allocation of resources.2 Stigmatising attitudes are found universally and can be deeply entrenched. For example, in some African countries traditional supernatural belief systems may lead to negative and hazardous responses to mental illness.3

Two factors are important in reducing the burden of stigma: personal awareness of mental illness and availability of effective treatments. Now that we have effective treatments for the major psychiatric disorders, the key to changing attitudes is education. Before embarking on large scale public campaigns, it is essential to establish baseline attitudes and knowledge to determine what exactly needs to be changed and how this can be most effectively achieved and monitored. For example, the Royal College of Psychiatrists conducted a baseline survey of UK public attitudes as part of its campaign to combat stigmatisation, Changing Minds: Every Family in the Land. The …