Please Stop Using Psychiatry Terminology To Describe Trump

In the spirit of responsible, compassionate use of free speech, I am asking all of us to reconsider use of “psychotic,” “manic,” “demented,” or other psychiatry-based terminology to describe Trump or his behavior. I want to give people who use these words the benefit of the doubt, but please consider the weight of those words. When psychiatric jargon is hurled as insults, it reinforces negative stigmas about mental illness. I am not a psychiatrist, but I have a few teenage patients with psychosis in my pediatrics clinic, and others with manic episodes. My colleagues in adult medicine have patients with dementia. These conditions are struggles. There is nothing to be ashamed of, but my colleagues and I have many patients who avoid care because they are afraid of social stigma about their conditions.