Sophie Worsnop

Psychiatry has followed the sine wave of development throughout modern history. With every new ‘breakthrough’ has come a significant low or lull in treatment progression. The changing tide towards true parity of esteem through recent policy speeches and campaigns by prominent individuals is a positive advancement and Daily Dose aims to seize on this new upward wave by proposing the next leap forward in treatment for mental health.  

It is with an estimated that 1 in 4 of us is dealing with a common mental health disorder at any one time. For those presenting less severe symptoms a current treatment practice may involve several trips to a general practioner, an addition to an ever expanding waiting list to either see a councillor or in more severe cases a psychiatric team where waiting time can be up to three months in London.

The proposal therefore consists of three varying programmes combined within one building. The holistic, medical and non medical. These elements merge at opportune moments and remain separated where demanded, at others, despite bearing a relationship to one another in plan. The ranging aspects of the programme are imagined with their own environments and atmospheres to reflect their functions and the feelings they attempt to evoke on the users.

A central spine running through the building contains a completely conditioned ‘no time’ zone, with spaces providing a constant daytime garden, arcade and light therapy. Research has proven that resetting the human body’s circadian rhythm can produce effective results in limiting a person’s depressive symptoms – by removing external stimuli (namely the changing light conditions during a 24hour day) the release of hormones such as dopamine and serotonin which have an effect on depression can be altered. This coupled with light therapy can see long term relief.

Situated around the no time zone core are areas which take a holistic approach to treatment. From talking therapies – both formal and informal, games and arts, reading and educational facilities, all to encourage community engagement.

The third strand of the proposal revolves around the future of medical progress in treating depression. Esketamine has shown to successfully decrease 70% of patient’s symptoms after just one day. This in comparison to SSRI anti depressants which only work on 30-50% of those prescribed them and can take up to a month to kick in. The Ketamine clinic treats referred patients, with a series of intravenous infusions spaced over a series of days. The clinic acts as a research centre to future the effectiveness of the treatment.  The patients from the clinic are encouraged to use the rest of the building’s facilities between treatments.

The resultant aim of the project is to experiment with the way we think about all elements of mental health treatment. Locating the proposal in the heart of Elephant and Castle challenges the assumption that somewhere quiet and hidden is appropriate– essentially another form of stigmatising the illness. Instead the project is located in plain sight as a celebration to the future of mental health treatment.