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I have worked as a consultant in the NHS, privately, and in national leadership roles. I have been researching the nature of suicide and suicide bereavement for over 16 years. My focus is on applying psychoanalytic/psychodynamic concepts to complex topics in mental health care and psychiatry. The aim is to encourage open, honest dialogue....I am currently thinking about the nature of self-harm, prejudice and discrimination in those diagnosed with a personality disorder, assisted dying/suicide and the defensive processes we use as clinicians to deny our own vulnerability. I am a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and group analyst.
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Recent Papers
The impossibility of working in the current NHS: sacrifice to a primitive god
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This paper explores the current crisis in the NHS, focusing on the ‘impossible’ demands faced by staff and the underlying psychodynamic factors that perpetuate these challenges. It examines how idealisation of the NHS has fostered an unconscious dependency on a fantasy of omnipotent care, akin to an idealised love. Rising demand, workforce shortages, and financial pressures have exacerbated these unrealistic expectations, contributing to systemic dysfunction.
The most downloaded downloaded paper ever from the Journal Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy May 2025 |
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The psychodynamics of self harm
The menopause transition: a call for a holistic approach
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This paper advocates for a holistic approach to the menopause transition and challenges the current dominant narrative that frames this transition primarily in biological terms. It examines the psychological, social and cultural dimensions, addresses the stigma faced by older women and advocates for the vital role psychiatrists have to play in supporting postmenopausal women.
BJPsych March 2025 |
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Suicide
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Mourning and mental illness
The mourning process and its importance in mental illness: a psychoanalytic understanding of psychiatric diagnosis and classification
BJPsych article of the month March 2024 |
Clinicians' experiences
Effects of patient suicide on psychiatrists: survey of experiences and support required
BJPsych April 2019 |
Rethinking suicide prevention
This paper critically examines key assumptions in suicide prevention, including the predictability of suicide, the role of suicidal ideation, and the conflation of self-harm and suicide
BJPsych International |
The nature of suicide and the impact on the bereaved
Book
Seminars in the Psychotherapies (Second Edition)
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'It is a full and wide-ranging book that can be used for reference or quiet study... it also includes throughout its pages a rich seam of personal reflection, literary quotations, on-the-hoof clinical anecdotes and case studies that help bring things to life.'
The book 'provides refreshing views of modern-day psychotherapy that are firmly rooted in principles psychoanalysis.'
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Other Articles, videos and podcasts
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Discussion about assisted dying with locked up living
The locked up living podcast Experiences and support needs of psychiatrists under investigation
BJPsych Experiences and support needs of consultant psychiatrists following a patient-perpetrated homicide
BJPsych Psychiatrists’ Experience of a Peer Support Group for Reflecting on Patient Suicide and Homicide: A Qualitative Study
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022 The 'impossibility' of working in the current NHS Podcast
The Tavistock Institute |
Valdo Calocane: Navigating the complexities of blame in the wake of tragedy: a call for realistic expectations of mental healthcare
BMJ Parity of esteem within the biopsychosocial model: is psychiatry still a psychological profession?
BJPsych The Psychodynamics of Self Harm
BJPsyche Advances |
Current Reccomendations
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You don't have to be mad to work here by Dr Benji Waterhouse
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Working in the Dark by Donald Campbell and Rob Hale
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