Conspiracy Against the Laity

I have lost count of the number of times of the number of times I have been in the psych hospital only to have to explain the intricacies of an illness that has only be recognised fairly recently: schizoaffective disorder. It’s been recognised in the US for years. Here it used to be regarded as an unfortunate occurrence of schizophrenia and  bipolar affective disorder. These poor souls were doubly affected, doubly cursed. Sometimes our double affliction was dismissed entirely. Now, all is well and we are fully paid up members of  ‘the mental illness club’ I’d like to know why it took the boffins so bloody long to see what most of us had seen for years. Maybe its time medical researchers started listening to patients. It makes George Bernard Shaw’s (well, who else) maxim that ‘the professions are a conspiracy against the laity’ seems truer than ever.

Tags: academia, medicine, mental illness, rant, schizoaffective disorder