Healing: Our Path from Mental Illness to Mental Health

Rarely does a book come along that has so much potential to influence American policy and quality of life as this one does. In order to effectively deal with any crisis, it is important to understand the factors that created it. Here psychiatrist/neuroscientist Insel (former director, National Inst. of Mental Health) describes the current mental health care crisis in the United States in plain terms. In clear detail, using extensive research and narratives, many of them personal, he defines the social factors that have led to this crisis. Insel asserts that U.S. society already has the tools necessary to deal with and even eradicate this crisis. Educating the public, he believes, and lessening or eliminating the stigma attached to mental illness will allow the nation to properly arrange—and utilize to their fullest—the resources that are already available, thus allowing healing instead of continually providing expensive, temporary patches.