mental health law

[jwtaylor]

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i am a philosopher by training. over the years my interests have developed into a full blown interest in the philosophy of psychology/psychiatry. i'm interested in the mind and i am also interested in law. specifically mental health law. im interested in mental health care and neuroethics. the intersection between the legal system and the mental health profession absolutely amazes me. i find myself wondering if i should pursure graduate education in psychology. i have clinical interests (i've worked in the mental health field since i started college), but i don't know if a PhD would be a good fit for me. this is because i'm not entirely sure if the research i want to pursue is appropriate to clinical phd programs. i want to know more about psychology in general and explore the clinical applications. i want to extend my knowledge beyond a lay understanding. i would like to do this in addition to my goal of going to law school. do you guys have any ideas about the best sort of graduate program for me? keep in mind i will have a degree in philosophy with only three psych classes under my belt and clearly no research experience. but i am open to changing that after i graduate if necessary.
thanks

 

[erg923]

I think the answer really comes down to what career path you want. There are a few JD/Ph.D programs. They are very competitive and you would have to do considerable work in term of doing the psych prereq classes and research experience to get there. On the other hand, if you intend on going to law school, you can always concentrate in mental health law and practice mental health law as a lawyer. You would not have any formal clinical training in psych, but would be in the position to work within and resesrch the intersection between mental health and law. Obviously, probably more heavily weighted towards the law side of things though. As I said before, this really just depends on your career goals and what kind of job you would like to obtain.

 

[WannaBeDrMe]

there are at least a handful of jd/msw programs and jd/mpa programs and jd/mph and jd/mpp... i would say any of those alternative concentrations with an emphasis on mental health policy/current social issues would be sufficient to give you adequate knowledge to practice law more effectively...

 

[MaddieMay]

Sounds like you already know what you are going to do.

 

[toby jones]

There are several programs that offer a Masters Degree in something approximating the Philosophy of Psychiatry. There is one here:

http://www.mastersportal.eu/students/browse/programme/3440/philosophy-of-mental-disorder.html

Another here (this one would enable you to have more of a focus on law):

http://www.pitt.edu/~bioethic/progoffMA.htm

Basically... Google is your friend.