Attitudes of doctors

From
http://www.cmj.slma.lk/cmj4501/17.htm
Silva, H. 2000, Suicide in Sri Lanka: points to ponder, Ceylon Medical
Journal

"
A significant proportion of all categories of health personnel expressed
non-sympathy towards parasuicide and alcoholic liver disease compared
with their attitudes to other illnesses. There was no significant
difference between the expressed personal and professional attitudes.
"

This may not happen in the UK but it's an interesting piece of attitudes
research. A meta-analysis that was published last year in the British
Journal of Psychiatry (or the year before) looked at quality of
healthcare and pre-existing diagnosis. It showed that there was evidence
to support the association between mental health diagnosis and poorer
quality of healthcare compared to physical illnesses in general. If I
remember the study right, and it's a while back, the authors considered
the effect may be based on symptoms but it turned out the biggest factor
was a pre-existing diagnosis. The paper considered the problem of
measuring quality of healthcare.

Alex J. Mitchell, Darren Malone, and Caroline Carney Doebbeling
Quality of medical care for people with and without comorbid mental illness and substance misuse: systematic review of comparative studies
The British Journal of Psychiatry, Jun 2009; 194: 491 - 499.