title: Physician-assisted suicide: a mental health perspective.
abstract: Despite their wealth of relevant clinical and research experience, mental health professionals have contributed relatively little to the active and ongoing debate about physicians assisting in the suicide of their patients. Methodologies developed for the study of completed suicide, the knowledge they have revealed, and the complex questions that remain unanswered, all must be considered. Similarly, psychiatry's extensive contributions to our understanding of the doctor-patient relationship, fundamental to the practice of psychodynamically informed treatments, have been almost completely ignored. Mental health care providers have much to contribute to, and should become actively involved in, this important public health and policy debate.
authors.affiliation: University of Rochester Medical Center, NY 14642, USA.
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Conwell
mesh_terms: D001293:Attitude to Death; D001927:Brain Diseases; D003379:Countertransference; D006801:Humans; D028642:Persons with Psychiatric Disorders; D010554:Personality Disorders / Q000523:psychology; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D012945:Social Values; D013405:Suicide / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology*; D017236:Suicide, Assisted / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology*; D013727:Terminal Care / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology; D014167:Transference, Psychology; D000092864:Suicide Prevention