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Psychiatrists in USA Europe
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Chef_Barbell wrote: »cmriverside wrote: »I keep reading on this site that help is difficult to access...I'm in the U.S. and I've never run into "backlog" issues when seeking any type of medical or psychological help. Interesting.
With that said, my personal issues are best solved by me. I've tried "therapy" and found it to be not only unhelpful but actually harmful. Same with pills.
YMMV, but I do best both physically and mentally when I eat well, get enough sleep and generally live by the rule that, "What people think about me is none of my business."
Prayer, meditation, exercise, writing in a journal, eight hours sleep, and good nutrition are far more healing to me than outside help.
Financial situations would make a difference here. As well as insurance.
Yes. If you are able to pay cash, it's pretty easy to find a private practice to suit your needs.
If you want to use private insurance, your options are fewer.
If you are on public assistance (Medicare, Medicaid), your options dwindle even further, and these providers are particularly backlogged.1 -
Just to clarify a few terms, because the OP asked specifically about psychiatrists.
Psychiatrists are MDs, trained in general medicine at a medical school, and choose psychiatry as their specialty. They can prescribe medication to treat psychological illness, but do not generally engage in therapy.
Psychologists are PhDs, having completed a doctorate-level program in psychology. They can diagnose psychological disorders, but cannot prescribe medication. They engage in therapy sessions.
Psychiatrists and psychologists often work together to treat one patient, as many people need both medication and therapy.
With anyone calling themselves a "therapist" or a "counselor", you have to check credentials. Some have Masters-level training, some a Bachelor's, and maybe some no formal training at all...think "life coach".
I think there's a lot of confusion sometimes, just like when people discover there's a difference between a registered dietician and a nutritionist.5 -
Well said @SuzySunshine99
The difference between all different types of providers matters in care. And sadly like most things in this country, money talks.1 -
We have a very skewed ratio of psychiatrists to patients here- 1:500 approx
a celebrity shrink from a posh hospital in a posh neighborhood himself admitted this! He gives mental health advice in the newspaper. I'm very lucky to have 2 shrinks in my middle class neighborhood!! I've been to both my former shrink has gone crazy herself but my current shrink is brilliant!! Infact he's the one who motivated me to pursue law! And just the other day I read about a state run mental asylum in the next town having 7 vacant posts for shrinks despite good salary and incentives!! It's just that psychiatry is not a very popular profession in India. What's the ratio in USA and also what does your law say about euthanasia? I'm just asking generally don't get me wrong here!! 0 -
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics thinks there are about 25,520 psychiatrists in the US**, and the US population was 331,449,281 million in 2020 (most recent census). Sounds like 1 for every 12,987 people?
** More details about them here: https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes291223.htm
As observed above, though, that's not the full story. There are various types of therapists, well-credentialed and otherwise. I wouldn't even begin to know how to estimate a sensible ratio of therapists to population, and it would be very uneven across the country anyway. (The link above shows how unevenly the psychiatrists are distributed across states.)
Laws on euthanasia differ state by state in the US: A lot of things are in state law, not federal law, and that's one. AFAIK, active euthanasia is illegal in most states (i.e., "mercy killing" or "assisted suicide"), but withdrawal of treatment or feeding (passive euthanasia) is mostly legal in at least some scenarios in most states. Also legal, mostly, as far as I know, is use of drugs to relieve suffering in terminal illness, even if those drugs may potentially cause death as a side effect **** . . . but I'm not a lawyer.
**** I may've done that, but there's no way to be sure. If I did, it was the right thing to do, and I'm accepting of the possibility.3 -
Mangoperson88 wrote: »We have a very skewed ratio of psychiatrists to patients here- 1:500 approx a celebrity shrink from a posh hospital in a posh neighborhood himself admitted this! He gives mental health advice in the newspaper. I'm very lucky to have 2 shrinks in my middle class neighborhood!! I've been to both my former shrink has gone crazy herself but my current shrink is brilliant!! Infact he's the one who motivated me to pursue law! And just the other day I read about a state run mental asylum in the next town having 7 vacant posts for shrinks despite good salary and incentives!! It's just that psychiatry is not a very popular profession in India. What's the ratio in USA and also what does your law say about euthanasia? I'm just asking generally don't get me wrong here!!
Practicing psychiatrists in Belgium: around 2000, which is a ratio of 0.17 per 1000 inhabitants (total population is 11.56 million). Slightly lower than the European average of 0.19 per 1000 inhabitants.
Clinical psychologists in Belgium: around 10900.
As for euthanasia: active euthanasia has been legal in Belgium since 2002 (heavily regulated). There were around 2700 cases last year.0 -
Mangoperson88 wrote: »We have a very skewed ratio of psychiatrists to patients here- 1:500 approx a celebrity shrink from a posh hospital in a posh neighborhood himself admitted this! He gives mental health advice in the newspaper. I'm very lucky to have 2 shrinks in my middle class neighborhood!! I've been to both my former shrink has gone crazy herself but my current shrink is brilliant!! Infact he's the one who motivated me to pursue law! And just the other day I read about a state run mental asylum in the next town having 7 vacant posts for shrinks despite good salary and incentives!! It's just that psychiatry is not a very popular profession in India. What's the ratio in USA and also what does your law say about euthanasia? I'm just asking generally don't get me wrong here!!
I thin you'll find the ratio is much, much lower than that - 2019 it was 0.75 psychiatrists to 100,000 people. Or are you saying that each psychiatrist has 500 patients?
In a lot of countries (or areas of countries) which are traditionally patriarchal, mental health issues have historically been treated as shameful, particularly when it is men seeking help. They've been expected to "man up" and having emotional or mental distress has been viewed as 'unmanly'. Women's mental health is just as disrespected, but on a different basis, they're not expected to be 'strong' and not have it, but more that it gets dismissed as 'weak women's issues'. Many countries, and cultures (including subcultures) are slowly becoming more open to accepting psychiatry and mental health treatment as mainstream medical treatment, but there's a long way to go, particularly as there is such a distant ratio of practitioner to population.
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Mangoperson88 wrote: »We have a very skewed ratio of psychiatrists to patients here- 1:500 approx a celebrity shrink from a posh hospital in a posh neighborhood himself admitted this! He gives mental health advice in the newspaper. I'm very lucky to have 2 shrinks in my middle class neighborhood!! I've been to both my former shrink has gone crazy herself but my current shrink is brilliant!! Infact he's the one who motivated me to pursue law! And just the other day I read about a state run mental asylum in the next town having 7 vacant posts for shrinks despite good salary and incentives!! It's just that psychiatry is not a very popular profession in India. What's the ratio in USA and also what does your law say about euthanasia? I'm just asking generally don't get me wrong here!!
I think your ratio number might be off...are you talking about the ratio in all of India or just your area? Because if 1:500 were true for all of India, the country would have 2.7 million psychiatrists. I don't think that's the case.
As Ann stated, it's hard to say what the ratio is in the US if you count all mental health professionals, not just psychiatrists. And, your location really does matter. There are far fewer mental health services available in rural areas than in urban ones. But, in all cases, the system has been overwhelmed since the start of the pandemic, with not enough providers to handle the number of patients seeking care.
As a side note...I understand that English is not your first language, and there are cultural differences as well, but be aware that the term "shrink" is not well received in the mental health community. Every mental health professional that I know would be offended to be referred to in this way. In the US, it is an outdated term.0 -
SuzySunshine99 wrote: »Mangoperson88 wrote: »We have a very skewed ratio of psychiatrists to patients here- 1:500 approx a celebrity shrink from a posh hospital in a posh neighborhood himself admitted this! He gives mental health advice in the newspaper. I'm very lucky to have 2 shrinks in my middle class neighborhood!! I've been to both my former shrink has gone crazy herself but my current shrink is brilliant!! Infact he's the one who motivated me to pursue law! And just the other day I read about a state run mental asylum in the next town having 7 vacant posts for shrinks despite good salary and incentives!! It's just that psychiatry is not a very popular profession in India. What's the ratio in USA and also what does your law say about euthanasia? I'm just asking generally don't get me wrong here!!
I think your ratio number might be off...are you talking about the ratio in all of India or just your area? Because if 1:500 were true for all of India, the country would have 2.7 million psychiatrists. I don't think that's the case.
As Ann stated, it's hard to say what the ratio is in the US if you count all mental health professionals, not just psychiatrists. And, your location really does matter. There are far fewer mental health services available in rural areas than in urban ones. But, in all cases, the system has been overwhelmed since the start of the pandemic, with not enough providers to handle the number of patients seeking care.
As a side note...I understand that English is not your first language, and there are cultural differences as well, but be aware that the term "shrink" is not well received in the mental health community. Every mental health professional that I know would be offended to be referred to in this way. In the US, it is an outdated term.
Yes English is not my first language and neither is math my strong subject but thank you for letting me know that shrink is offensive to American doctors. I meant that we have very few psychiatrists for a large number of population in urban areas itself. This mental health discussion came into light when a Bollywood movie star committed suicide in June 2020. That's when the discussion about mental health seriously began and of course it coincided with the pandemic. I don't know about rural America but it is far worse here and thank God i don't live in a godforsaken village because mental illness in rural India is equated with being possessed by evil spirits and so they're taken to tantriks(spiritual doctors). I have read cases where these guys rape women under the pretext of getting rid of the spirits residing in the woman's body. It's slightly better in metros but still india has the highest suicide rate and my state ranks third in the whole country for the number of suicides.1 -
Like lietchi i assumed everyone in USA goes to therapists or psychiatrists and lawyers and psychiatrists mint money because either everyone is suing everyone or undergoing therapy to deal with it. Again sorry if I'm offending anyone. I don't watch Netflix or tv shows but I've read a lot of crime novels and someone is always in a mental hospital, especially females, because they suffered scary abuse as children so they're seperated from their kids and it's a whole big conspiracy and stuff like it is supposed to be in books.0
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Mangoperson88 wrote: »Like lietchi i assumed everyone in USA goes to therapists or psychiatrists and lawyers and psychiatrists mint money because either everyone is suing everyone or undergoing therapy to deal with it. Again sorry if I'm offending anyone. I don't watch Netflix or tv shows but I've read a lot of crime novels and someone is always in a mental hospital, especially females, because they suffered scary abuse as children so they're seperated from their kids and it's a whole big conspiracy and stuff like it is supposed to be in books.
You seriously need to stop believing every novel and TV show/magazine article/"news" story you see.
Novels (especially crime novels) are FICTION. They are entertainment. People like outrageous behavior in their fictional characters.
That would be a whole different thread topic.
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Mangoperson88 wrote: »Like lietchi i assumed everyone in USA goes to therapists or psychiatrists and lawyers and psychiatrists mint money because either everyone is suing everyone or undergoing therapy to deal with it. Again sorry if I'm offending anyone. I don't watch Netflix or tv shows but I've read a lot of crime novels and someone is always in a mental hospital, especially females, because they suffered scary abuse as children so they're seperated from their kids and it's a whole big conspiracy and stuff like it is supposed to be in books.
Yeah no.
ETA- Realize that the USA is made of 50 different states and within those states are people with vastly different ideas, racial make ups and socioeconomic backgrounds. This is a melting pot and no one person is exactly like the other here... and there usually isn't a majority of anything here.1 -
Mangoperson88 wrote: »Like lietchi i assumed everyone in USA goes to therapists or psychiatrists and lawyers and psychiatrists mint money because either everyone is suing everyone or undergoing therapy to deal with it. Again sorry if I'm offending anyone. I don't watch Netflix or tv shows but I've read a lot of crime novels and someone is always in a mental hospital, especially females, because they suffered scary abuse as children so they're seperated from their kids and it's a whole big conspiracy and stuff like it is supposed to be in books.
It's easy to make assumptions from things like this, but I try to remember that I should ask the folks who live there, making it clear that I have an assumption from 2nd/3rd hand information (and maybe biased besides).
News media focus on unusual and dramatic exceptions to the norm. Fiction is fiction: There needs to be drama and conflict, or there's no story. Even published memoirs are likely to present people with unusual lives, because average ones are mostly boring reading. Even first person experience can mislead, if limited: If I meet 3 people from (country Y) and they're all braggarts/liars, I might assume that all Y-ians are braggarts and liars. Maybe I just met an unrepresentative sample?
Not so much on this thread, but I've seen people make themselves look pretty foolish on other threads, by telling residents of country X what country X is like, when they have no personal direct observation to support that.
The same thing applies to people posting confidently about what it was like in the 1960s or 1980s when they weren't even alive then (but they watched the movies about it!), what it's like to be female when they've always been male, etc. Caution, caution, caution: So easy to look really foolish, doing that kind of thing.
The audience will tend to forgive ignorant questions ("did lots of people do (ABC) in the 1980s?"), more than they will accept confident but ignorant assertions. Example: One dude on a thread asserted that people didn't know about calories in the . . . I think it was 1960s, but I might be off by a decade . . . so they couldn't lose weight back then. Um. No. (That's actually especially bad, because a person could Google that for a better answer, eh?)
In a place like the MFP Community, the only persona we have is the reputation that we create in other people's minds via what and how well we communicate. That's a little scary to me, TBH. It's hard to know what others' image of us may be!
P.S. @Mangoperson88, I think your English is excellent. It never occurred to me that English wasn't among your first languages. (I've had work colleagues from your country who grew up speaking English from babyhood, alongside other language(s), I'm guessing because of the history of British influence in some areas (though I dunno for sure if that's why)?
Things like which word choices are offensive in another country or culture - that's really nuanced and variable, I think. I agree that psychiatrists here mostly wouldn't like being called "shrinks", but there are subcultures here where that term would be completely accepted among everyday people, and the term "psychiatrist" might be used in a tone of voice that implies irony or with the implication that it's a fancy-dancy ivory tower kind of thing. Code-switching is real.
Sometimes I marvel that humans ever manage to communicate with each other at all, well enough to accomplish all the complicated things that get accomplished in the world.
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"Like your govt can't control the gun violence and it's now dangerous to walk down the street in USA as if it were Afghanistan similarly my govt got blinders on about mental health awareness and doctors are not helping." This is one of the most ridiculous, untrue comments I have seen here. Anywhere in the USA is better than anywhere in Afghanistan. Please keep your judgment on my Country to yourself. Thanks.1
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I'm in the US, and I don't find that doctors dismiss psychiatric care at all. It's actually quite the opposite in my experience. When I (45 year old female) visit my primary care doctor or my OBGYN, they both ask about my mental health, and are in complete agreement when I give them an update that includes my psychiatrist and therapist. I have a well rounded team of doctors, thankfully.
As far as backlogs of doctors and having to wait, it really depends on what area you're in, and if your need is specialized. For me, I was able to get an initial appointment with my psychiatrist within 3 weeks of my call. For my 14 year old son, it took 5 months to get him in for an autism diagnostic screening (he is not on the spectrum, but was diagnosed with several mental health problems). Once we got the results, it was another 6 months before his first appointment was available. Now that we're established I am able to schedule a couple of appointments out so he's seen about once a month.
I find the biggest stigma around metal health comes from our peers and the general population (especially for men). You're seen as weak, a drama queen/king, or attention seeker if you talk about needing mental health or reveal that you're on medication and/or seeing a therapist. It's incredibly sad, especially when people are only trying to improve their lives, and be able to function like a "normal" person.2 -
johnlauramoore1 wrote: »"Like your govt can't control the gun violence and it's now dangerous to walk down the street in USA as if it were Afghanistan similarly my govt got blinders on about mental health awareness and doctors are not helping." This is one of the most ridiculous, untrue comments I have seen here. Anywhere in the USA is better than anywhere in Afghanistan. Please keep your judgment on my Country to yourself. Thanks.
Well one could say that is a judgement on Afghanistan - people there might not like derogatory remarks about their country either.
admittedly less likely to be on MFP to say so.
Anyway OP and the thread have moved on - once a side comment/issue has been clarified, I think it doesn't need further outrage.
( I post as neither an American or an Afghan)
I agree with previous posters that stigma about mental health comes from segments of the general population - there are still some people who think, wrongly, of course, that depression or mental heath issues are a sign of weakness or cause for ridicule or scorn.
There have been campaigns in last year of so in Australia encouraging men to seek help for such problems and that it is ok not to be ok
of course women have mental health problems too but they, on the whole, do not have the same reluctance to seek help.
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Alatariel75 wrote: »Mangoperson88 wrote: »We have a very skewed ratio of psychiatrists to patients here- 1:500 approx a celebrity shrink from a posh hospital in a posh neighborhood himself admitted this! He gives mental health advice in the newspaper. I'm very lucky to have 2 shrinks in my middle class neighborhood!! I've been to both my former shrink has gone crazy herself but my current shrink is brilliant!! Infact he's the one who motivated me to pursue law! And just the other day I read about a state run mental asylum in the next town having 7 vacant posts for shrinks despite good salary and incentives!! It's just that psychiatry is not a very popular profession in India. What's the ratio in USA and also what does your law say about euthanasia? I'm just asking generally don't get me wrong here!!
I thin you'll find the ratio is much, much lower than that - 2019 it was 0.75 psychiatrists to 100,000 people. Or are you saying that each psychiatrist has 500 patients?
In a lot of countries (or areas of countries) which are traditionally patriarchal, mental health issues have historically been treated as shameful, particularly when it is men seeking help. They've been expected to "man up" and having emotional or mental distress has been viewed as 'unmanly'. Women's mental health is just as disrespected, but on a different basis, they're not expected to be 'strong' and not have it, but more that it gets dismissed as 'weak women's issues'. Many countries, and cultures (including subcultures) are slowly becoming more open to accepting psychiatry and mental health treatment as mainstream medical treatment, but there's a long way to go, particularly as there is such a distant ratio of practitioner to population.
Or women's physical issues or (historically) non-domestic aspirations are treated as mental health problems.1
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