About this book

Never before has a guide on how to negotiate the increasingly stretched NHS, and obtain the care you need, been more essential.

This offers crucial advice to families and to individuals on how to not be palmed off with inadequate care.

And how to grasp what you are entitled to - as well as how to best look after the well-being of yourself and your loved ones.

This radical new and expert book shows you:
â
how to diagnose yourself
how to develop a better understanding of what to do about the most common mental health problems
how to engage and negotiate with GP and specialist services.
how to know when you need to get professional help, and the issues you can effectively and safely tackle yourself.

The book is essential in enabling you or your supporters to get the system to change your diagnosis if you are not happy with it.

The authors of this new guide are both internationally-known Consultant Psychiatrists with many decades of experience of working on frontline psychiatric services.

They show you how to:

get your problems or those of a relative treated with adequate priority.
to see the records kept on you.
to evaluate if you are getting the correct treatment.
to find out if that mortgage you got denied was down to something a doctor recorded in your medical history.
to correct your physician's notes if they are wrong.
to obtain the best specialist help available in the NHS.


Various theories are commonly advanced as to the dramatic increase in poor mental health across broad swathes of our community, with tough economic conditions and social media frequently blamed. None of these problems are going to go away soon.

This book is your essential guide to getting the best care in the prevailing critical situation.