Ministry of Justice

FHC for Mediation is a member of the CMC and is a fully accredited mediator provider

Michael T Isaac

MA, MB BS, MRCPsych, Gaskell Medal RCPsych, MAE, QDR

Consultant Psychiatrist
Accredited Mediator (ADR QDR)

Dr Mike Isaac’s CV, Psychiatrist and Mediator.PDF

QUALIFICATIONS:

1982 MA Cambridge

1982 MB BS London

1990 MRCPsych

1991 Gaskell Medal RCPsych

1996 MAE

2003 QDR

PRESENT COMMITMENTS:

Consultant Physician & Senior Lecturer in Psychological Medicine 1982
Consultant Physician
Forensic Psychiatry
Co-Director, Psychopharmacology Evaluation Unit
Recognised Trainer in Psychiatry, University of London
PhD Examiner, University of London 1997 –
Alternative Dispute Resolution (Mediation) Qualified 2003
Member General Medical Council (GMC) Fitness to Practice Committees

EXPERIENCE:

Trained in neuropathology in Glasgow
Psychiatric training (Bethlem Royal & Maudsley Hospitals, London) in forensic psychiatry, drug abuse, & psychotherapy
Specialist training in neuropsychiatry (National Hospital for Neurology & Neurosurgery, London), especially of epilepsy, head injury & conversion disorders
Expert witness in PTSD, personal injury
Expert witness in cases of sexual offenses etc
Expert witness in Care Proceedings
Asylum Seeker psychiatric and medical reports
Expert witness in adolescent psychiatry
Pathology of head injury
Extensive experience as expert witness giving evidence in Court
Lecturer in UK and USA Canada, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, Taiwan, Mexico, Turkey, Brazil, Argentina

Dr Isaac familiar with the Istanbul Protocol and regularly use its Medical Screening Instrument. Dr Isaac has extensive experience in the assessment and medico legal reporting of the psychiatric sequelae, such as PTSD, of physical and psychological abuse, including torture and other ill-treatment. Dr Isaac has experience of assessment internationally, in country (Peru) and in the UK (range of nationalities).

MEDIATION EXPERIENCE

Mike became convinced of the exciting possibilities for mediation (alternative dispute resolution, ADR), early in his career as an expert witness called upon to report in matters as diverse as personal injury, employment and disability, and clinical negligence. Accordingly, Mike trained in ADR at the Academy of Experts, obtaining the QDR (Qualified in Dispute Resolution) in 2003.

Mike’s psychiatric training has fitted closely into his work as a mediator. Most of Mike’s mediations have been commercial mediations, though he has unofficially mediated in clinical disputes, too. Mike maintains his QDR skills, and latest mediation was in March 2016, though there are more lined up in 2017. Mike also acts as a Serious Untoward Incident (SUI) investigator in employing NHS Trust, and is regularly instructed by both Claimant and Defendant in cases involving the NHSLA. Mike sat on GMC Fitness to Practice Panels for many years, and continues to sit on the Inns Of Court Panels and on the Chartered Accountants’ disciplinary body. So often, Mike has seen matters which could easily have been resolved by ADR blown into registration-threatening cases without need.

Nothing Mike has encountered in mediation work and busy and wide-ranging clinical and expert witness practice has altered my earlier conviction that, in the NHS especially, mediation has enormous potential to limit and even prevent the psychological damage that can occur to complainants – and those complained against – during the complaints process, particularly when an unresolved complain is followed by litigation. Many – probably most – of the clinical negligence and employment Claimants whom Mike meets would have been satisfied with a mediated solution to their complaint and would not have gone further. Many are less interested in financial compensation than they are in understanding what happened and, if appropriate, an acknowledgement and apology. Mediation, ADR, can facilitate the process in so many ways, not least in making substantial savings in a burgeoning compensation bill met by the NHSLA.

Most people who have used ADR have seen that it works. Mike certainly has. Mediation empowers people to keep control of their disputes and not place them at the hazard of litigation. ADR is highly cost-effective, and his nearly fifteen years’ experience of it have continually reinforced that view. Mike considers that ADR has historically been under-used within the NHS, and that its time has now come.

SPECIAL INTERESTS:

Forensic Psychiatry
Psychiatry
Psychopharmacology
Pharmaco-economics
Chronic pain
Head injury and schizophrenia
Stress and mood disorders
Depression
Neuropsychiatry
Neuropsychiatry of brain and spinal cord injury
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Many research papers written on all the above
Discrimination (disability and racial)
Bullying at work

RESEARCH:

Pharmaco-economics
Mood disorders
Stress occupational psychiatry
Research bio-ethics
Obesity and nutrition (his book “Eat Yourself Happy”, pub Carroll & Brown (London, UK) 2004)

SOCIETIES/ASSOCIATIONS:

Gaskell Gold Medal
Royal College of Psychiatrists
Register of Accredited Specialists in Psychiatry held by the GMC
Approved by the Secretary of State for the purposes of Section 12(2) of the Mental Health Act (1983)
Practising member of the Academy of Experts
Member Academy of Experts, American Academy of Psychiatry & Law, American Psychiatric Association
British Association for Psychopharmacology, British Pharmacological Society
Neuro-psychopharmacology, Collegium Internationale Neuro-Psychopharmacologicum (Fellow)
British Neuropathology Society
British Neuropsychiatric Association, Cambridge
Philological Society, American
Association for General Hospital Psychiatry, Society for Medical Decision Making
International College of Psychosomatic Medicine (Fellow)

PUBLICATIONS AND MEDIA:

Media interviews in South London Press, Daily Express ,Mail on Sunday ,Press Association, Independent on Sunday, Slimming, BBC World Service, BBC Radio 4 You &Yours , Drive Time , BBC Radio Wales, GLR
Appearances ITN lunchtime news, News at Ten, BBC Breakfast, BBC News 24, BBC London (London Live Radio &London Tonight TV), Channel 4 News
Medical Adviser, Royal Opera House Orchestra,1992-2001
Adviser, BBC Features, Wall2Wall Films, Tiger Aspect Films