O DSM e os Discursos Contemporâneos: uma leitura psicanalítica de uma prática nos EUA

Abstract

This Master s Program Dissertation has aimed at studying a model of mental health care based on the compulsory and early use of the diagnosis supported by the paradigm of biological psychiatry, and its consequent medicalization. It stems from reflections on an experience as a therapist at an NGO in the United States of America. In the model of that therapeutic practice we detected several aspects that sometimes stigmatized the individuals and did not take into account their specific characteristics, imposing a series-oriented tactic to professionals rather than a singular-subject approach. We have attempted to demonstrate how this type of clinical practice , which we consider bureaucratized can provide a subjective change in the individual under treatment. The Dissertation initially presents an account of this experience in the United States of America, followed by a discussion on the categories of the normal and the pathological, as well as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) used in that service model, addressing the historical contexts that produced it, as well as the changes it has gone through in its different editions. Next, considerations are made about the use of this Manual, such as, for example, not taking into account the subjects cultural characteristics, as well as adopting indiscriminate and exaggerated use of medication. Finally, in the light of the Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, we make considerations about university and capitalist discourses in order to develop better ideas about the clinical practice in question