“The name in vain? Clinical and ethical dilemmas in making/not making a personality diagnosis.”
Facilitator: Anita Chakrabarti MD, LLB, FRCPC
This seminar will review articles that consider ethical and validity issues that arise when diagnosing patients with personality disorder features. As well it will review the alternative model of personality disorder as proposed in the DSM-V which has the intention of improving personality disorder diagnosis. The background reading is intended to stimulate discussion about the tensions arising in clinical practice in identifying / not identifying problematic personality traits.
Anita Chakrabarti MD, LLB, FRCPC is a psychiatrist in office based practice in Vancouver. She is an Assistant Professor with the Northern Ontario School of Medicine teaching psychodynamic psychiatry via distance education.
Photo Credits: Isaac Bignell , Into A New Tomorrow – Swallows, 1993, Acrylic on canvas
Learning Objectives:
At the end of this presentation participants will be able to:
- Consider the idea that psychiatric diagnostic categories and practices have consequences and therefore pose ethical problems.
- Review the historical development of the concepts of personality and personality disorder and consider validity-related issues
- Introduce the Alternative DMS-5 Model for Personality Disorders in the context of reviewing ethical and validity concerns of the current model.
Reading Materials:
- Personality Disorder and Validity: A History of Controversy — Chapter 52, The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy and Psychiatry, 2013, Peter Zachar and Robert F. Kruger
- Ethics and Values in Diagnosing and Classifying Psychopathology – Chapter 72, The Oxford Handbook of Psychiatric Ethics, 2015, John Z. Sadler
- Alternative DSM-5 Model for Personality Disorders p. 761 to 781, DSM-5, American Psychiatric Association,