Dr Steve Birrell is a Consultant Psychiatrist with over 16 years of experience working in the field, over 9 of which have been at Consultant level within the NHS in Scotland (NHS Fife).
After completing training in the south-east Scotland region, he cut his teeth for 7 years in a busy sector-based general adult psychiatry role in west-Fife, covering both inpatients and community/outpatients, presenting with a full range of psychiatric, organic, trauma-related, substance-related, and neurodevelopmental disorders.
In June 2022, he took a role in his dream job as a Consultant Liaison Psychiatrist (a specialist in psychiatric issues arising alongside physical ill health) within the Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy, Fife, where he continues to work four days per week. His day-to-day work involves the assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of working-age adults with mental disorders within the acute hospital, at the interface between physical and psychological health, leading the management of complex patients, including those with severe mental illness, personality disorders, and medically unexplained/somatoform disorders. He has extensive experience in the use of the Mental Health (Care & Treatment) (Scotland) Act 2003 and the Adults With Incapacity (Scotland) Act 2000.
Dr Birrell commenced his career as an independent medicolegal Consultant Psychiatrist in 2017, working locally and nationally with solicitors to offer independent opinions for patients subject to the Mental Health (Care & Treatment)(Scotland) Act 2003 and certification of Incapacity for Guardianship or Intervention Orders under the Adults With Incapacity (Scotland) Act 2000. He also worked with individuals within the criminal justice system, particularly in the provision of opinions regarding fitness for trial and the appropriateness of ongoing restriction for mentally disordered offenders as they recovered. He also worked with Insight Psychiatric Services in Edinburgh between 2017 and 2022, where he honed his interest in civil legal work.
Dr Birrell’s main medicolegal areas of interest include trauma-related disorders (including industrial, military, and historic child abuse), somatisation disorders, medically unexplained symptoms, psychiatric disorders arising alongside physical difficulties/injuries, human factors related to psychiatric practice, and psychopharmacology. He enjoys working with cases, including any of the above, in the context of medical negligence, personal injury, survivors of institutional abuse, and more. Dr Birrell also has extensive tribunal and court experience through medico-legal work and his NHS role.
Dr Birrell also has educational responsibilities within his NHS role, where he is the Clinical Lead for Training & Education within the Mental Health & Learning Disability service. These duties predominantly revolve around the quality improvement and assurance of 24 training posts across three programmes (core psychiatry, general practice, and foundation) and the oversight of the resident doctor rota (including monitoring and compliance). He also provides clinical and educational supervision to multiple doctors in training and delivers clinical teaching in various forms to undergraduate medical students and postgraduate resident doctors. He co-organises and co-chairs the NHS Fife postgraduate psychiatry teaching and journal club. In addition to his NHS work, Dr Birrell is an Honorary Clinical Senior Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, whom he frequently represents on consultant job interview panels, where he sits on the Fitness to Practice committee of the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine; and for whom he frequently both lectures and examines. He is currently leading the development of a clinical programme for the University of St Andrews upcoming ScotCOM medical degree course. He is also an examiner for the Clinical Assessment of Skills and Competencies, the practical and final test for those wishing to become a Member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
In his spare time, Dr Birrell enjoys writing, reading, cooking, playing/composing music, hillwalking, and building Lego with his children.