My experience has been a mixed bag. When I was in IP there were men and women pdocs and therapists. There were people from various racial backgrounds. White practitioners were actually a minority in my IP experience.

The same was true of the patients in the ward I was on. The first ward had men and women and there was a mix of racial backgrounds and ages. The second ward I was on was for women only, but there was a healthy mix there as well that seemed fairly representative of the relative numbers of each race and agre group in my community.

It is not important what age or race or gender my practitioner is. My main concern is to work with someone who can add value.

The female pdoc I worked with was of color. She dismissed me at every appointment and asked me questions she would not have asked if she took 5 minutes to read my file. I did not attribute this to her color or gender, but to her lack of care. I actually wanted to work with a woman because the trauma related to my case is easier for me to discuss with a woman. I was disappointed with her care and always sensed she was just trying to move as quickly as possible to get on to the next patient.

The older Indian pdoc I initially saw in IP was awesome. Very knowledgeable. Very caring. The woman I saw works in his practice, so he is a poor judge of hiring talent, but he is a good pdoc. I wanted to stick with him, but he mostly handles all of the IP patients, so I had to choose between his two in office pdocs.

The white male pdoc at the same practice is my preferred provider. He remembers me and asks me questions beyond just how my meds are working. We discuss my therapy progress and my pursuit of my own psychoanalytic efforts. He actually cares and my empathy senses feel he is genuine. He has offered advice beyond what med adjustments to take. He listened when my meds had adverse affects. He weaned me off meds eventually.

As for patriarchal, I agree as far as the history of modern psychiatry. Historically, many cultures deal with mental illness quite differently. They view it as a spiritual disturbance that requires intervention on a soul level. Some cultures deem males fit for that duty. Some look to females and others believe it is a journey to be taken alone. All of them focus on addressing the root causes over the modern preference to apply the band aid of medicine to manage symptoms.

We actually used to have far fewer patients experience recurrance of symptoms here in America before pharmacology intervened...