The Psi-Star Team in Royal College of Surgeons Ireland attended the IEPA15 Conference in Berlin in September. The IEPA15 is the 15th year of the Early Intervention in Psychosis and Mental Health Association annual conference, and the third year with living experience input. In Psi-Star (a three-year project run by the RCSI), five PhD Teams are working on improving various aspects of practice, policy and education around early intervention in hearing voices/psychosis in Ireland and work in attempting to shift the still significant stigma around what is known as hearing voices, or psychosis – formerly schizophrenia.
There are people with living experience (Patient Public Involvement – PPI) on each team currently. Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) is research conducted with or by the public, not simply about, to, or for them. PPI is now central to mental health research policy in Ireland, as well as internationally. Published just last year and shaped by PPI contributions, the new Irish National Mental Health Research Strategy demonstrates that involvement is now a fundamental part of the research process rather than simply an optional project choice.
The IEPA15 Conference had around a thousand attendees, with around a third of the presentations being from psychiatric survivors or living experience. While heavy on medical and academic science there were a good few talks that centred around the strength of peers getting together, Mad Festivals and the experiences of people who suffer voices or psychosis. I gave a short presentation on the pros and cons of cbd and cannabis as a voice-hearer, in a symposium which included epidemiologists and some eminent academic experts on psychosis. The consensus is that while cbd is good for this condition, high Thc is not (Cbd and Thc are two constituent compounds of interest of the cannabis plant).
The RCSI Psi-Star team also shared updates on our recent projects over the past two years. The QUB team, which I am a part of, has created a classroom module about Hearing Voices and schizophrenia for 16-year-olds, and this module is currently being piloted in Belfast.
The conference highlighted new technologies such as avatar therapy and CBTp apps for psychosis. The mood was congenial between those of us with living experience, professors of psychiatry, practitioners and allied professionals. It’s best to collaborate without compromising core beliefs. I talked to a drug rep from the pharmaceutical industry and quoted a recent statistic – that over 50% of girls aged 12-17 in North America are currently taking antidepressants. To which he replied, “Well… Over half of people may be depressed. I gave him an incredulous look at that point and we parted ways. Also, I wondered what Peter Gøtzsche, the Danish Psychiatrist would have made of this conference? (In his 2015 book Deadly Psychiatry and Organised Denial, Gøtzsche claims that psychotropic drugs are minimally effective but highly dangerous, stating that 98% of users with mental disorders could discontinue them. He believes only a few need short-term antipsychotics or benzodiazepines during acute episodes, with gradual tapering to avoid withdrawal. Gøtzsche says national authorities should revise psychiatric guidelines and open discontinuation clinics.)
Separately, in early October 2025, the World Voices Congress was held in Prague by the energetic and dynamic Czech Hearing Voices network. On Day One talks included Rai Waddingham and Kelly Stastny on Motherhood and hearing voices. Other talks were on: children who hear voices and how to work effectively with them; some inspiring survivor testimonies on healing outside the standard psychiatric system; voice-dialoguing (a technique whereby a therapist dialogues directly with a person’s voices); and a theatrical presentation from Hearing Voices Network Athens. Day Two saw how a growing number of survivors can thrive and evolve without antipsychotics; perceptions on social psychiatry from Dr Dirk Corstens; dialogue and personality as fundamental therapeutic tools; The Yucel Tactile Therapeutic Method, and love and relationships between voice-hearers. Stories are the core of social psychiatry, not labels. Overall, an amazing couple of days, hearing from many great speakers. We find our tribe.