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The Medical Research Council Unit in Child Psychiatry
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 July 2009
Extract
To understand anything, it is helpful to know its history. All psychiatrists are confronted by clinical problems that have developed over a large part of their patients' life span. This applies most obviously to the disorders of personality, but it is also true of many disorders arising in adult life. The roots of depression can sometimes be traced back to suffering and loss in childhood. Schizophrenia is often preceded by long periods of cumulative problems in personal relationships; and recent theory has drawn attention to very early signs of abnormality in the perinatal period. Many child psychiatric disorders present as enduring traits. The model of ‘psychiatric illness’ tends to emphasize the change and discontinuity from previous life, but it is also necessary to understand the extent to which an individual's plight can be seen as the product of character and stress.
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