Dr. E. Fuller Torrey Discusses His Book The Insanity Offense

Aug. 31, 2008 - PRLog -- Join Jacqueline Foreman, host of Your Mental Health Talk Radio as she interviews Dr. E. Fuller Torrey about his fascinating book The Insanity Offense How America's Failure To Treat The Seriously Mentally Ill Endangers Its Citizens.  The show will air live on Saturday, September 6th at 4 PM ET/1 PM PT and can also be listened to in archived format at www.blogtalkradio.com/yourmentalhealth.  You can also visit Your Mental Health's home on the Internet at www.yourmentalhealthradio.com for more information.

Beginning in the 1960s in the United States, scores of patients with severe psychiatric disorders were discharged from public mental hospitals. At the same time, activists forced changes in commitment laws that made it impossible to treat half of the patients that left the hospital. The combined effect was profoundly destructive. Today, among homeless persons, at least one-third are severely mentally ill; among the incarcerated, at least one-tenth. Of those individuals living in our communities, many are the victims of violent crime. Other untreated individuals commit crimes, including murder and assault. In The Insanity Offense, E. Fuller Torrey takes full stock of this phenomenon, exploring the causes and consequences as he weaves together narratives of individual tragedies in three states with sobering national data on our failure to treat the mentally ill. In the book's final chapters, Torrey outlines what needs to be done to reverse this ongoing—and accelerating—disaster. E. Fuller Torrey, M.D., is a research psychiatrist specializing in schizophrenia and manic-depressive illness. He is the founder of the Treatment Advocacy Center and the Executive Director of the Stanley Medical Research Institute, which supports research on schizophrenia and manic-depressive illness. His work at the Stanley Medical Research Institute includes participating in ongoing collaborative research on viruses and other infectious agents as a cause of these diseases. He is also a Professor of Psychiatry at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, and an adjunct professor at the George Mason University School of Law.

From 1976 to 1985, he was on the clinical staff of St. Elizabeths Hospital, specializing in the treatment of severe psychiatric disorders. From 1988 to 1992, Dr. Torrey directed a study of identical twins with schizophrenia and manic-depressive illness. His research has explored viruses as a possible cause of these disorders and he has carried out research in Ireland and Papua New Guinea.

Dr. Torrey was educated at Princeton University (B.A., Magna Cum Laude), McGill University School of Medicine (M.D.), and Stanford University (M.A. in Anthropology), and trained in psychiatry at Stanford University School of Medicine. He practiced general medicine in Ethiopia for two years as a Peace Corps physician, in the South Bronx in an O.E.O. Health Center, and in Alaska in the Indian Health Service. From 1970 to 1975, he was a special assistant to the Director of the National Institute of Mental Health.

He is the author of 20 books and more than 200 lay and professional papers. Some of his books have been translated into Italian, Japanese, Polish, Russian, and Spanish.

Dr. Torrey has appeared on national radio and television (outlets like NPR, Oprah, 20/20, 60 Minutes, and Dateline) and has written for many newspapers. He received two Commendation Medals by the U.S. Public Health Service, a 1984 Special Families Award from NAMI, a 1991 National Caring Award, in 1999 received a research award from the International Congress of Schizophrenia and a humanitarian award from NARSAD, and a 2005 tribute included in NAMI's 25th Anniversary Celebratory Donor Wall. Born in Utica, New York, in 1937, he is married with two children.

Don't miss this very important show with Dr. Torrey.

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Your Mental Health is a program that deals with mental health issues and illness as well as the stigmas attached to people who suffer from various forms of mental illness.