(Jamaica Gleaner) Professor Frederick Hickling, one of Jamaica’s most respected psychiatrists and pioneer of cultural therapy, has died. He was 74.
“I have no more words,” tweeted his daughter Dr Deborah Hickling yesterday evening, announcing his death. “Love you pops,” she said.
Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton has hailed him as a “great man”.
The late professor was hailed by Opposition Leader Dr Peter Phillips as “a giant among his peers, a man who sought to bring a deeper level of understanding and appreciation of Jamaica, its people and culture for the purpose of social and psychological advancement.
“… Jamaica has lost a faithful and accomplished son,” Phillips said.
Hickling was professor emeritus of psychiatry at The University of the West Indies (UWI) and former executive director of the Caribbean Institute of Mental Health and Substance Abuse.
More than a decade ago, Hickling jolted policymakers with findings from research that revealed that up to 40 per cent of Jamaicans, between three and six times the global norm, exhibited personality disorders.
And in 2016, he argued that when a broad range of conditions, such as personality disorders, psychosis, and dementia are taken into account, “the prevalence of mental illness in our little island would exceed 70 per cent”. Addressing these, he said, were key to fixing issues such as crime and indiscipline.
Hickling was a graduate of Wolmer’s Boys’ School, The UWI, and the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.
In a long and distinguished career, he served as registrar of the 1962 Jamaica Independence Celebrations Committee and was once a reporter for The Gleaner.
Hickling was a member of numerous local, regional, and international organisations, including the New York Academy of Sciences, the United Kingdom’s Royal Society of Medicine, and the National Council on Drug Abuse, which he chaired from 2003-2007.
The Government honoured Hickling in 2012 with the Order of Distinction (Commander class).
