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Semantics instead of treatment
The move away from an ‘illness’ to ‘personal responsibility’ puts the onus on the patient to find the answers, so they can get themselves better, writes Ruth Hunt
night projection

THE demand for psychiatric services, including inpatient beds, is at an all-time high, but the capacity to treat such inpatients has not kept up, with some regions in the UK faring worse than others, the Royal College of Psychiatrists report from 2019 found.

This has resulted in the threshold for getting admitted increasing, leaving service-users who are unwell, including some people with a serious mental illness such as depression not meeting the threshold for admission.

These service-users might be offered therapeutic tools through Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) and receive, for example, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) or they might try to find a therapist, on a private basis, who can help them deal with their symptoms.

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