While I was LA doing my show, I had a walk-in day each Monday where the public could come in for free (an almost unknown word there) and have the a-list (this time not celebrities) of neuroscientists and other experts to give the latest information about what works and what’s coming in the future as far as treatments. We had Andrew Leuchter, director of the Laboratory of Brain, Behavior, and Pharmacology and Senior Research Scientist at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. (In other words a big gun) He uses brain-imaging techniques to examine brain function and predict which treatments are most likely to benefit individual patients by measuring brain waves so he can read immediately if a drug is going to be effective or not. Now you won’t have to sit through those agonizing months waiting if a drug is going to work and if it doesn’t, start again.
We also had the head of NAMI (national alliance of mental health) Sharon Dunas (an angel) who informed everyone where to get free help, not just for those with mental illness but for their families and friends. There were also free classes to learn about drugs and what therapy does. She told us that when her daughter went to University (she had been the brightest in her class before that) she suddenly refused to eat and mentally shattered. Sharon said she made a deal with herself, if her daughter lived she would build a centre where anyone who needed help could get it free. She also organizes yearly walks (Something I always wanted to do in the UK) where about 5,000 people march to bring awareness as far as stigma. It’s exactly what the gays did and look where it’s got them; free at last, free at last.
With those heavy hitters in the room, it was as if the floodgates of questions we all want answered opened: how far away is the cure, why the stigma, what really helps drugs or therapy? The reactions in the audience were that people loved it; they were so grateful in a country that seems to have everything yet still can’t find help or even admit to needing it. And boy do they need it.
We also had the head of NAMI (national alliance of mental health) Sharon Dunas (an angel) who informed everyone where to get free help, not just for those with mental illness but for their families and friends. There were also free classes to learn about drugs and what therapy does. She told us that when her daughter went to University (she had been the brightest in her class before that) she suddenly refused to eat and mentally shattered. Sharon said she made a deal with herself, if her daughter lived she would build a centre where anyone who needed help could get it free. She also organizes yearly walks (Something I always wanted to do in the UK) where about 5,000 people march to bring awareness as far as stigma. It’s exactly what the gays did and look where it’s got them; free at last, free at last.
With those heavy hitters in the room, it was as if the floodgates of questions we all want answered opened: how far away is the cure, why the stigma, what really helps drugs or therapy? The reactions in the audience were that people loved it; they were so grateful in a country that seems to have everything yet still can’t find help or even admit to needing it. And boy do they need it.
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