Dr Ken Kaufman, RCpsych Pan-American Division, Chair

Dr Angela Carballedo, RCPsych European Division, Chair

Dr Marie  Nicolini is an ethicist and psychiatrist whose research addresses moral questions related to mental disorders and their implications for medicine and public health. She was previously a postdoctoral fellow at the National Institutes of Health Department of Bioethics, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University, and held a research grant from Belgium's public research council.

Her work has been published in journals such as the British Journal of Psychiatry, American Journal of Bioethics, Journal of Medical Ethics, and Psychological Medicine.

Dr Anne Doherty is a consultant liaison psychiatrist at the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital Dublin, and her clinical work is mainly in Psycho-Oncology. She is the local clinical lead for the Self-Harm Programme at the Mater Hospital. She has a research interest in suicidal ideation and behaviours in adults.

She has authored a systematic review on the topic of the relationship between suicidal ideations and behaviours and assisted dying. As Head of Subject in Psychiatry at University College Dublin her interests also span medical education and has delivered educational interventions to improve the understanding of suicidal ideations and behaviours across all medical specialties.

In this webinar, Dr Doherty will provide a systematic review highlighting the flaws in the included studies, and an overall increase in all-cause self-initiated deaths associated with the legislation for assisted suicide and euthanasia. The most concerning finding was the increase in deaths of older women, so there is a gendered aspect to this.

We know from the epidemiology that older people (male and female) have a higher death by suicide: self-harm ratio, and despite that their self-harm is much more likely to result in death, they are a neglected group in the broader suicide research compared with other demographic groups.

Professor Jill Stavert is Professor of Mental Health and Capacity Law at Edinburgh Napier University where she leads the Centre for Mental Health Practice Policy and Law Research. Her areas of research and expertise are international, European, and national human rights and mental health and mental capacity law and related law, policy and practice review and reform.

Jill’s recent work has included being a member of the Scottish Mental Health Law Review Executive Team, investigating views and experiences of the Mental Health Tribunal for Scotland and the impact of COVID-19 and related restrictions on law, policy and practice relating to persons with mental disabilities.

Previously, she was an expert advisor to the Scottish Independent Review of Learning Disability and Autism in the Mental Health Act and a member of the Deprivation of Liberty and Supported Decision-Making Working Groups in the Scottish Government review of the Adults with Incapacity (Scotland) Act.

Amongst other things, she is currently contributing to the mental health and capacity law reform programme in Scotland and a project co-producing an evaluation tool for mental health legislation compliance with the UNCRPD led by colleagues at Law Trobe University, Melbourne, and Griffith University, Gold Coast, Australia.  

This event is taking place online via Zoom. To take part you will need:

Please note: It is up to the participant to ensure that they have the correct requirements in place prior to booking the event.