Addressing racism: the role of mental health professionals.

Racial discrimination and racism are ubiquitous. These feelings and resulting acts of discrimination contribute to the mental illnesses among those who experience it and face it regularly. Although efforts have been made at international level to develop correct definitions and actions to mitigate and eliminate these acts in policies, reality remains very different.

A proposed new definition of mental health.

The authors propose a new approach to the definition of mental health, different than the definition proposed by the World Health Organization, which is established around issues of person's well-being and productivity. It is supposed to reflect the complexity of human life experience.

EPA guidance on cultural competence training.

The stress of migration as well as social factors and changes related to the receiving society may lead to the manifestation of psychiatric disorders in vulnerable individuals after migration. The diversity of cultures, ethnicities, races and reasons for migration poses a challenge for those seeking to understand how illness is experienced by immigrants whose backgrounds differ significantly from their clinicians. Cultural competence represents good clinical practice and can be defined as such that a clinician regards each patient in the context of the patient's own culture as well as from the perspective of the clinician's cultural values and prejudices.

Patient experienced continuity of care in the psychiatric healthcare system-a study including immigrants, refugees and ethnic danes.

Aim: The purpose of this study was to investigate continuity of care in the psychiatric healthcare system from the perspective of patients, including vulnerable groups such as immigrants and refugees.

Method: The study is based on 19 narrative interviews conducted with 15 patients with diverse migration backgrounds (immigrants, descendents, refugees, and ethnic Danes). Patients were recruited from a community psychiatric centre situated in an area with a high proportion of immigrants and refugees.

Stigmatization of psychiatrists and general practitioners: results of an international survey.

The stigma of mental illness affects psychiatry as a medical profession and psychiatrists. The present study aimed to compare the extent and correlation patterns of perceived stigma in psychiatrists and general practitioners. An international multicenter survey was conducted in psychiatrists and general practitioners from twelve countries.

Current research in transcultural psychiatry in the Nordic countries.

This article discusses major themes in recent transcultural psychiatric research in the Nordic countries from 2008 to 2011: (a) epidemiological studies of migration, (b) indigenous populations, and (c) quality of psychiatric care for migrants. Over the past several decades, the populations of the Nordic countries, Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden, which were relatively homogeneous, have become increasingly culturally diverse. Many migrants to Nordic countries have been exposed to extreme stress, such as threats of death and/or torture and other severe social adversities before, during, and after migration, with potential effects on their physical, mental, social, and spiritual health.

Measuring the stigma of psychiatry and psychiatrists: development of a questionnaire.

The stigma of mental illness is a severe burden for people suffering from mental illness both in private and public life, also affecting their relatives, their close social network, and the mental health care system in terms of disciplines, providers, and institutions. Interventions against the stigma of mental illness employ complementary strategies (e.g.

Register-based studies on migration, ethnicity, and health.

Introduction: Researchers in Denmark have unique possibilities of register-based research in relation to migration, ethnicity, and health. This review article outlines how these opportunities have been used, so far, by presenting a series of examples.

Research Topics: We selected six registers to highlight the process of how migrant study populations have been established and studied in relation to different registers: The Danish Cancer Registry, the Danish Central Psychiatric Research Register, the Danish National Patient Register, the Danish National Health Service Register, the Danish Injury Register, and the Danish Medical Birth Register.

Quality of dementia diagnostic evaluation for ethnic minority patients: a nationwide study.

Background/aims: Diagnostic evaluation of dementia for ethnic minority patients may be challenging. This study aimed to evaluate the quality of diagnostic evaluation of dementia for patients from ethnic minorities in Denmark.

Methods: The Danish national hospital registers were used to identify patients from the main ethnic minority groups in Denmark, who were diagnosed with dementia in the period 2005-2007.

Gender, human rights and cultural diversity: reflections on a career in transcultural psychiatry.

The three issues of gender equality, human rights and cultural diversity have dominated my organizational commitments, research, and clinical practice in transcultural psychiatry. These issues are intertwined in many ways and have broad implications for transcultural psychiatry. With increasing globalization, psychiatrists in many countries are likely to be treating patients who have migrated from different cultures and who may have been exposed to a variety of traumatic experiences that have a profound impact on their mental health.

Late mental health changes in tortured refugees in multidisciplinary treatment.

The aim of this study was to examine long-term changes in symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety, and in health-related quality of life in traumatized refugees 23 months after admission to multidisciplinary treatment. The study group comprised 45 persons admitted to the Rehabilitation and Research Centre for Torture Victims in 2001 to 2002. Data on background, trauma, present social situation, mental symptoms (Hopkins Symptom Checklist-25, Hamilton Depression Scale, Harvard Trauma Questionnaire), and on health-related quality of life (World Health Organization Quality of Life-Bref) were collected before treatment and after 9 and 23 months.

WPA guidance on how to combat stigmatization of psychiatry and psychiatrists.

In 2009 the WPA President established a Task Force that was to examine available evidence about the stigmatization of psychiatry and psychiatrists and to make recommendations about action that national psychiatric societies and psychiatrists as professionals could do to reduce or prevent the stigmatization of their discipline as well as to prevent its nefarious consequences. This paper presents a summary of the Task Force's findings and recommendations. The Task Force reviewed the literature concerning the image of psychiatry and psychiatrists in the media and the opinions about psychiatry and psychiatrists of the general public, of students of medicine, of health professionals other than psychiatrists and of persons with mental illness and their families.

Rehabilitating torture survivors.

Refugees have often been exposed to torture in their countries of origin. A core issue is the resulting multifaceted presentation of somatic, psychological and social problems in the same individual, leading to severe activity limitations and participation restrictions. An international conference, "Rehabilitating Torture Survivors", was organized by the Rehabilitation and Research Centre for Torture Victims (a rehabilitation clinic and global knowledge and research centre with government support) in collaboration with the Centre for Transcultural Psychiatry at Rigshospitalet in Copenhagen, Denmark, in December 2008.

[Gender differences in stress among physicians].

Introduction: It is difficult to evaluate gender differences in relation to health because occupation and position are different for males and females. It is therefore necessary to evaluate how health is affected for both genders with the same working conditions. The purpose of this study was to evaluate: 1) gender differences in relation to different stressors within daily life, working life and health, 2) how these stressors affect the correlation between stress and gender.