East Asia Center
Tuesday October 15, 2013
October 15, 2013 | 6:30 p.m.
Kane Hall, Room 120
This lecture will provide a historical overview of the changing landscape of mental health in China since liberation (1949) with an emphasis on the economic reform era, which started in 1978. Dr. Phillips, a UW-trained public health psychiatrist who has lived and worked in China since 1985, will describe the many social, economic and political factors that have influenced the perception and management of mental disorders in China through the lens of his own personal experiences. He will describe the pattern of mental illnesses in the country identified in a large epidemiological study, the dramatically changing rates of suicide, and the governments’ gradual recognition of the importance of mental illnesses, as exemplified in the recent passage of China’s first national mental health law.
Dr. Phillips is a Canadian citizen who has been a permanent resident of China for 30 years. He received a BSc (psychology) from McGill University, an MD from McMaster University and an MA (anthropology) and MPH (epidemiology) from the University of Washington. He completed his psychiatry residency training at the University of Washington followed by a two-year Robert Wood Johnson Research Training Fellowship. He is currently Director of the Suicide Research and Prevention Center and the Research Methods Consultation Center of the Shanghai Mental Health Center at Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, the Executive Director of the WHO Collaborating Center for Research and Training in Suicide Prevention at Beijing Hui Long Guan Hospital, Professor of Psychiatry and Global Health at Emory University (USA), Professor of Clinical Psychiatry and Clinical Epidemiology at Columbia University (USA), Visiting Professor at Peking Union Medical College (PUMC), advisor on mental health issues in China for the WHO, Treasurer of the International Association for Suicide Prevention, Co-Editor-in Chief of the Shanghai Archives of Psychiatry, and editorial consultant for The Lancet.