Rethinking how we respond to distress - with the Not Broken Project

Join us for a powerful webinar that challenges the status quo in mental health care.

The Not Broken Project is dedicated to raising awareness about the disadvantages of overmedicalising distress and advocating for a shift in policy toward addressing the social, developmental, and environmental roots of mental distress.

This session will:

- Present the evidence base on overmedicalisation and its impact on recovery.

- Explore how to balance medical and psychosocial frameworks to create more holistic support.

- Invite practitioners to reflect on how language, culture, and service design shape help-seeking, power, and recovery outcomes.

Why this matters:

- Over 7 million Australians—more than a quarter of the population—are currently prescribed mind altering drugs for emotional distress and behavioural challenges.

- The widely promoted “chemical imbalance” hypothesis is not supported by scientific evidence, yet it continues to justify lifelong prescriptions.

- While validation of symptoms can be helpful, assuming medication is the only path forward can be disempowering, stigmatising, and false.

- Withdrawal from these drugs can be extremely difficult, and Australia currently lacks meaningful deprescribing support.

- Social, environmental, and developmental factors play a major role in distress, but drugs alone cannot address these deeper causes.

This webinar is for practitioners who want to be part of the solution—shaping recovery approaches that empower individuals, reduce reliance on medication first models, and encourage more effective, compassionate systems of care.