The initial series of posts are complete. You can view them in order at The Heart of the Matter. From here on, things will work just as any other blog does … I’ll offer occasional insights in the world of mood-disorder treatment, going into the future.

Unfortunately, I have few answers to offer to all of the many problems I’ve cited above (in my initial series of posts which you can read, in order, at The Heart of the Matter). They’re beyond my expertise, and in most cases, are beyond anyone’s skill, at this point.My message is simple: Despite the problems, [...]

Let’s get down to one of the most contentious aspects of mental health care in the U.S., today. Managed care was invented in the early 1970’s, as a way to hold down spiraling health-insurance costs. It has since become an institution all its own, a true driving force behind how mental illnesses are treated — [...]

So far, you may think I’m in the “anti-psychiatry” camp, but I am not. By no means! For all of the problems with psychiatry I’ve pointed out so far, I think the anti-psychiatry folks are far more dangerous to those with mental illnesses, than even the worst psychiatrists.When I talk, here, about the “anti-psychiatry movement,” [...]

Depression has been known for well over 2,000 years. The famed ancient Greek physician, Hippocrates, called it melancholia. This name comes from the Greek words μελας χωλη, or “black bile;” the Greeks thought an overabundance of black bile, a fluid formed by the liver, made one melancholy (a word which has come to mean “depressed”). [...]

For a lot of people, mental illness is something they know only in the headlines, usually when a mentally-ill person commits a crime. The case of Andrea Yates leaps to mind, but many others have graced the pages of our newspapers or the screens of our television sets.When mental illness is something one hears about [...]

Rather than having three levels of treatment (routine periodic treatment in one’s doctor’s or therapist’s office, attendance at a day treatment or partial hospitalization program, and inpatient psychiatric wards), I propose that several more such levels be created. Among them:A level of outpatient clinical care, similar to partial hospitals, but perhaps a couple of hours [...]

While psychiatric-ward stays have saved many lives (including mine), overall, they aren’t always the best way to deal with a depressive. Since psychiatry has become crisis-oriented, however, they’re a necessary evil. They will continue to be, until psychiatry becomes less crisis-oriented.One of the main problems with putting depressed patients into psychiatric wards, is that they’re [...]

This is my term for when a mood-disorder patient is put on a medication, the dosage is raised, then another is tried, the dosage of that one raised, etc., in a fast-and-furious effort to find something — anything — that works. While providers often have good intentions behind putting a patient on the “medication mill,” [...]

Perhaps no single development has had more of an impact on the treatment of mood disorders, than the discovery of antidepressant medications, and for bipolar folks, mood stabilizers. Medications are the best-known treatments for mood disorders, and they are what most doctors will want to try first, when someone is initially diagnosed.While medications are often [...]