"A bold, expert, and actionable map for the re-invention of America's broken mental health care system As director of the National Institute of Mental Health, Dr. Thomas Insel was giving a presentation when the father of a boy with schizophrenia yelled from the back of the room, "Our house is on fire and you're telling me about the chemistry of the paint! What are you doing to put out the fire?" Dr. Insel knew in his heart that the answer was not...

"From the New York Times bestselling author of Black Man in a White Coat comes a powerful and urgent call to center psychiatry and mental health care into the mainstream of medicine. As much as we all might wish that mental health problems, with their elusive causes and unsettling behaviors, simply did not exist, millions of people suffer from them, sometimes to an extreme extent. Many others face addiction to alcohol and other drugs, as overdose...

For centuries, doctors have struggled to define mental illness--how do you diagnose it, how do you treat it, how do you even know what it is? In search of an answer, in the 1970s a Stanford psychologist named David Rosenhan and seven other people--sane, normal, well-adjusted members of society--went undercover into asylums around America to test the legitimacy of psychiatry's labels. Forced to remain inside until they'd "proven" themselves sane, all...

"Part case studies, part meditation on the past, present and future of the disease, [this book] traces Alzheimer's disease from its discovery and tells the story of the biomedical breakthroughs that may allow it to finally be prevented and treated by medicine. While it is a scathing indictment of our health care system, it is also an argument for how we can live with dementia; the ways patients can reclaim their autonomy and redefine their sense of...

"In this in-depth critique of the mental healthcare system, a leading advocate for the mentally ill argues that the system fails to adequately treat the most seriously ill. He proposes major reforms to bring help to schizophrenics, the severely bipolar, and others"--

"A compassionate, heartrending memoir of a mother's quest to accept her son's journey through psychosis. One night in 2009, Tanya Frank finds her nineteen-year-old son, Zach--gentle and full of promise--in the grip of what the psychiatrists would label a psychotic break. Suddenly and inexplicably, Tanya is thrown into a parallel universe: Zach's world, where the phones are bugged, his friends have joined the Mafia, and helicopters are spying on his...

"An examination of the psychology of women who commit violent crimes"--

Psychological first aid, or PFA, is designed to mitigate the effects of acute stress and trauma and assist those in crisis to cope effectively with adversity. PFA is designed to be applied in emergencies, including disasters and terrorist attacks. In this essential guide, George S. Everly, Jr., developer of the Johns Hopkins RAPID PFA method, and Jeffrey M. Lating, his collaborator in its implementation, describe the principles and practices underpinning...

"A personal story of depression, as well as a journalistic account of its role and ramifications in society today"--