History of Psychiatry online event | Women in Psychiatry

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06Jun

Afternoon Event

Timings 1.30PM - 5PM
Location Virtual event, Online
CPD Up to three hours subject to peer approval
Non-member£93
Consultant£70
SAS doctor£53
Higher Trainee£53
Core Trainee£36
Medical student/Foundation doctor£36
Retired member/subsidised£36
Allied Health Professional£36
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History of Psychiatry online event | Women in Psychiatry

Event Information

In celebration of Fiona Subotsky’s 80th Birthday HoPSIG has organised an Essay Prize and online Conference on Women and Psychiatry in History. 

This conference looks at notable women who tried to work in Psychiatry  - from the Female Georgian Asylum Proprietors  through the centuries to personal experience of the last 40 years. 

We plan to have the essay prize winner talk about their work as part of the meeting. 

Most of this area is little known or discussed and the Conference should be of interest to anyone wanting to explore the role of women in this profession.

  • 1.30pm - Introduction and welcome, Dr Caroline Hayes
  • 1.35pm - Leonard Smith:  'Forgotten in the History of Psychiatry? Women Proprietors of Private Madhouses and Asylums, 1650-1890'
  • 2.10pm - Jane Robinson: 'Helen Boyle'
  • 2.30 pm - Hannah Blythe: 'Mrs Ethel Vickers and Mental After-Care' 
  • 2.55pm - Discussion
  • 3.10pm - Break 
  • 3.20pm - Claire Hilton: 'Barbara Robb'
  • 3.40pm - Gianetta Rands: 'How women have changed psychiatry in the last 50 years'
  • 4.10pm - Wendy Burn: 'Women in Psychiatry – my experience of the last 40 years'
  • 4.30pm - Essay prize winner presentation
  • 4.45pm - Discussion, chaired by Dr Caroline Hayes
  • 5.00pm - Event ends

Leonard Smith

Leonard Smith is Honorary Senior Research Fellow in the Institute of Applied Health Sciences, University of Birmingham. He has published extensively on the history of psychiatry and mental health institutions in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century England and also in the former British Caribbean colonies. His most recent book, Private Madhouses in England, 1640-1815: Commercialised Care for the Insane, was published in 2020 by Palgrave Macmillan. He trained as a Psychiatric Social Worker in the 1970s and has worked in various capacities within mental health services since that time.

Jane Robinson

Jane Robinson is an acclaimed social historian, focusing on women pioneers. She has written thirteen major books, including Bluestockings, the story of the first women to access higher education in Britain; Ladies Can’t Climb Ladders, about the first women to enter the traditional professions (including medicine), and ground-breaking biographies of nurse Mary Seacole, social reformer and artist Barbara Bodichon, and the inspirational humanitarian Josephine Butler. She is a Fellow of both the Royal Historical and Royal Geographical Societies, a Hawthornden Fellow, and a Senior Associate of Somerville College, Oxford. 

Her current project is a group biography of five women responsible for changing perceptions of ‘madness’, set against a cultural and social history of women and mental disorder before 1947. Helen Boyle, first female president of the Royal Medico-Psychological Association, is one of the five. 

Hannah Blythe

Hannah Blythe is a health humanities researcher with interests in mental health, psychiatry,  health and welfare charity, Britain’s National Health Service (NHS), and interdisciplinary methods. She is a Research Fellow at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), working on the history of charity in the NHS as part of the Border Crossings project on charity and voluntarism in Britain’s mixed economy of health care since 1948. She is an affiliated researcher at the Birkbeck Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Mental Health.

Prior to joining LSHTM, Hannah completed her PhD in Cambridge University History Faculty. Her thesis examines the history of psychotherapy and psychological recovery in British mental health charities between 1879 and 1939. She previously worked in policy in the charity and local government sectors, and holds an MA in Health Humanities from UCL and a BA in History from the University of Durham.  

Claire Hilton

Claire Hilton is an Honorary Research Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London. From 1998 to 2017 she was a NHS consultant old age psychiatrist in London. She has a MA and PhD in history, and she has authored two monographs Improving Psychiatric Care for Older People: Barbara Robb's Campaign 1965-1975 (2017) and Civilian Lunatic Asylums During the First World War (2021).

She is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. While RCPsych Historian in Residence, she was awarded a RCPsych 'President’s Medal' for her historical work contributing to mental healthcare education, policy and practice. Her current research is on mental hospitals in England in the 1920s.

Claire holds the role of the College's Honorary Archivist between 2024 - 2029.

Gianetta Rands

Gianetta Rands retired from clinical practice in 2024, after 43 years as a trainee doctor, GP, and psychiatrist. During that time, she had many educator roles, including ten years as UCL Training Programme Director for SHOs. She contributed to many RCPsychiatry committees of regional and national significance. 

She edited “Psychiatry: Women’s Voices” published in 2018 by Oxford University Press, and contributed a chapter titled “Women in UK Psychiatry and Mental Health” to ‘Mind, State and Society; Social History of Psychiatry and Mental Health in Britain 1960–2010’ edited by George Ikkos and Nick Bouras (2021).

Wendy Burn

Wendy was appointed as a Consultant Old Age Psychiatrist in Leeds in 1990 and currently works part-time in a community mental health team for older people and as the National Mental Health Clinical Advisor to Health Education England.

She has been involved in the organisation and delivery of postgraduate training since she started as a consultant. She has held many roles in education. She set up the Yorkshire School of Psychiatry and was the first Head of School.

She was Dean of the Royal College of Psychiatrists from 2011 to 2016 and President from 2017 to 2020.

The event will be recorded. A copy of the recording will be sent to delegates to view back for three months after the event. 

If you are not able to attend live, you will still be sent the recording if you have bought a ticket.

This event is taking place online via Zoom. To take part you will need:

  • access to a reliable internet connection
  • a PC, laptop, tablet or phone
  • Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge browser or Zoom installed on your PC, laptop, tablet or phone.

Please note:, it is up to the participant to ensure that they have the correct requirements in place prior to booking the event.

Joining instructions for the event will be sent out a few days before the event. 

Please read our terms and conditions before making your booking, which includes:

  • Event Cancellation Policy
  • Privacy Policy
  • Code of Conduct

Event registrations are confirmed when payment is received in full.

For further information, please contact:

Email: catriona.grant@rcpsych.ac.uk

Contact Name: Catriona Grant

Event Location

Location: Virtual event, Online