Is psychiatry a prestigious medical specialty?

Question

Among the non-medical public,shrinks are often considered as madmen. Physicians tend to consider psychiatry as a "not very serious" specialization. I would like to specialize in psychiatry, but I am afraid of the stigma.

Answer 1

Psychiatry is a prestigious medical specialty. With the higher stress rates and the need for doctors who know what the heck they are doing we need more psychiatrists in this country. Psychiatric hospitals have shut down across the country because of the lack of help and doctors to run them.

Answer 2

Psychiatrists work for the drug companies. Virtually anyone feeling blue about themselves can go into a psychiatrists office and come out with a diagnosis, and a prescription for a pricey drug. These "diagnoses" arent even based on scientific or biological fact, in fact noone knows what these illnesses actually are. They speak alot about "imbalances in the brain", yet know one knows what balances they're talking about. Sure serotonin may be involved in depression, but nobody knows to what end, and that is not a justifiable reason to pump somebody full of SSRI that makes people want to kill themselves. (Look at Welbutrin).

There will always be a stigma because the history of psychiatry in this country is one to be ashamed of. Psychiatrists in this last century have almost made a mockery of science, used people as guinea pigs, institutionalized poor people, gay people, and alcoholics by saying that they were mentally ill. They used to strap people into Shock Therapy chairs in hopes of shocking the sanity back into them (and it was dangerous back in the 50s because they used way to much voltage), while causing massive memory impairment. They've prescribed amphetamines to our children, and made people dependent on prescription medications for the rest of their lives.

If you open the "bible" that psychiatrists use, the DSM-IV, you can see what a quackery this pseudoscience actually is. The disorders overlap each other and arent distinctive enough to hold a candle to. Oh this person is bipolar but has hallucinations, oh they must be bipolar I with schizoaffective disorder. Brilliant. Up until about 30 years ago Manic-Depression and Depression were considered the same disease. If anybody cant see why this is rediculous now, they really should have their head examined. In fact, a person entering a hospital for treatment of depression was given mood stabilizers (to treat what they thought was manic depression). Now that depressed person is 50 to 60 years old and has bipolar and is crowding up hospitals. 20 years from now theyll be floating from hospital to nursing home and back, with no prospects for recovery, no children that visit them, no way to live life without the use of a drug to help them. And they believe every single precious thing that the psychiatrist says because they dont know any better. Anybody who opposes them is considered "noncompliant". If they try to exercise their freedoms, the hospital will get a court order to continue treatment, inevitably lining the pockets of another pill-pusher and pill manufacturer.

Ive been in there, ive seen it all. Let me tell you, 50 years from now everyone will be laughing at the state of psychiatry today, atleast im hoping so.