Prof Chris Dowrick
Speaking on Wednesday 6th July 17.30 - 18.15
The 3rd Helen Lester Memorial Lecture - Suffering and Hope
Christopher Dowrick is Professor of Primary Medical Care in the University of Liverpool and a general practitioner in Aintree Park Group Practice. He is Board Advisor for Mersey Care NHS Trust, Senior Investigator Emeritus for the National Institute for Health Research in England, and Professorial Research Fellow in the University of Melbourne in Australia. He is a member of the World Organisation of Family Doctors’ working party on mental health, and a technical expert for the World Health Organisation’s mhGAP programme.
His research portfolio covers common mental health problems in primary care, with a focus on depression and medically unexplained symptoms. He critiques contemporary emphases on unitary diagnostic categories and medically-oriented interventions, and highlights the need for socially-oriented perspectives. He is currently investigating equity of access for people from marginalised communities, and exploring the concept of self in primary care encounters.
The second edition of his book Beyond Depression was published by Oxford University Press in 2009. He contributed to the BMJ ‘Too Much Medicine’ series on the over-medicalisation of depression.