The Family Guide to Mental Health Care
More than 50 million Americans experience some form of mental illness annually. A large number of these individuals fail to get appropriate treatment. Some don’t even receive a correct diagnosis. Sederer’s guide helps folks (particularly family members and friends of people afflicted with psychiatric conditions) familiarize themselves with all aspects of mental illness: symptoms, treatment, prevention, health-insurance issues, and the law. Tucked in the middle of this useful guide is a valuable chapter, “A World of Hurt: The Faces of Mental Illness,” that summarizes many mental-health disorders—generalized anxiety, obsessive-compulsive, panic, personality, bipolar, binge eating—as well as depression and schizophrenia but not alcohol or substance abuse. Treatments of these problems, including medications, psychotherapy, electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), and repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS), are described. Written by a psychiatrist who is a mental-health administrator, the presentation is practical and compassionate. The main message about mental illness is urgent and uplifting: recovery is possible but requires effort, excellent treatment, assistance from loved ones, patience, and steadfast hope. --Tony Miksanek