‘He sees patients as lesser people’: exploring mental health service users’ critiques and appraisals of psychiatrists in Canada

Abstract

Drawing on 5090 English reviews of 486 psychiatrists working in Canada posted on ratemds.com, this study empirically analyses how Canadian mental health service users critique or appraise their doctors. I explore how the online realm serves as a conduit for resistance and discourses about mental health that otherwise become suppressed by psychiatric power in clinical settings. I found that when doctors did not listen to their patients, make careful attempts to learn about their lives and problems beyond their clinical symptoms, and give them a sense of autonomy, service users felt like an inconvenience. Psychiatrists, on the other hand, who were constructed as kind, compassionate, non-judgemental listeners tended to receive praise from service users. Service users who had this kind of positive experience were more likely to align themselves with the forces of psychiatric power, meaning they believed in their doctor’s power to make decisions about their health.