This site is education, not treatment. Here's what that means in practice.
This is not medical advice
Everything on psychiatry.help is general educational information about psychiatric and mental health topics. It is not personalized medical advice. It is not a diagnosis. It is not a prescription. It is not a substitute for an actual evaluation by an actual clinician who has actually met you.
If something on this site sounds like it describes you, the next step is talking to a clinician, not deciding what to do about it on your own.
No doctor-patient relationship
Reading this site does not establish a clinical relationship between you and any of the clinicians who write here. We are not your prescriber. We are not your therapist. We have not evaluated you. We don't know your full history, your other medications, your current state, or anything else that would let us responsibly give you medical advice.
If you fill out the contact form and we connect you with a clinician, the relationship starts then, after a proper intake and evaluation, not when you read a blog post.
Emergencies
If you are in immediate danger, having thoughts of harming yourself or someone else, or in any kind of psychiatric crisis, do not rely on this website. Get real help right now:
- 911 for medical emergencies in the United States.
- 988 (call or text) for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, 24/7.
- Crisis Text Line: text HOME to 741741.
- Your nearest emergency room.
Author opinions
The clinicians who write here have opinions, and they share them. Those opinions are theirs as individual practitioners. They are not the official position of any health system, hospital, practice, professional organization, or regulator any contributor happens to be affiliated with. They are not pharmaceutical company positions. They are not anyone's marketing.
Where evidence is contested, we say so. Where we disagree with a popular position, we explain why. None of that means our take is the only correct one. It means it's ours, in writing, with our names on it.
Medications, dosing, and side effects
We describe how medications generally work, what dose ranges are typical, and what side effects are common. We do this in plain language to help readers understand what their own clinician is talking about, not so they can self-manage.
Specific dosing decisions, drug interactions, contraindications, taper schedules, and changes to your medication regimen are individual medical decisions. Do not change medications, start medications, stop medications, or adjust doses based on something you read here. Talk to your prescriber.
Information accuracy and timeliness
We try to be accurate. We cite our sources. Posts about medications, treatments, and conditions get clinical review, and the review date is in the page's structured data and visible in the post.
Even so: medical knowledge changes. FDA labels get updated. New trials come out. A post from a year ago might not reflect current practice. If a post seems out of date, check the modified date on the page and assume things may have shifted.
Jurisdiction
The clinicians who write here are licensed in specific states (primarily Oregon and Washington; some have additional licenses elsewhere). Anything on this site that reads as a clinical recommendation only applies within the bounds of that licensure. If you live somewhere else, the legal and clinical landscape may differ.
Insurance, scheduling rules, prescription restrictions, and access pathways vary state to state. We sometimes mention these in passing. We don't keep a comprehensive state-by-state map current.
Third-party links
We link to external sources: journal articles, professional society guidelines, government agencies (FDA, NIH, CDC), clinical databases. We don't control those sites. Their content can change. We're not responsible for what's on the other side of a link, but we try to link to sources that are themselves authoritative.
If you find an error
Tell us. Use the editorial contact form with the URL and what's wrong. We take corrections seriously and don't argue them, see our editorial standards for the corrections policy.
One more time
This is education. It is not your treatment. If you need treatment, please go get treatment.