What is mental illness?
• Mental Illnesses are biologically-based brain diseases that can severely disturb a person’s ability to think, feel, and relate to other people and the environment.
• New England Journal of Medicine in March 1990 reported, “definitive evidence that Schizophrenia is a brain disease and that involves more than genetic susceptibility.”
What are some of the more disabling Mental illnesses? How common are they?
• Schizophrenia is a brain disease that often strikes young people between the ages of 16 and 25. In any given year, nearly two million Americans age 18 and over have a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Some people with Schizophrenia experience hallucinations. They cannot distinguish between what is real and what is not. The exact causes are not known, but are believed to be biological, sometimes involving genetic factors.
• Depressive disorders—including Major Depression and Manic Depression Illness (Bipolar Disorder)—are very common and range widely in severity. Within any given year period, 6.3 percent of the population—about 15 million Americans—suffer from these disorders.
• The number one reason for hospital admissions nationwide is a psychiatric disorder. At any moment, patients with a psychiatric disorder fill almost 21 percent of hospital beds.
• Mental Illness is more common than Cancer, Diabetes, Heart Disease or Arthritis.
• A conservative estimate is that 12 percent or 7.5 million of the country’s 63 million youths under age 18 have Mental, Behavioral or Developmental Disorders. Only about a fifth of the 7.5 million who need mental health treatment receive it.
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a common mental disorder which affects 3 to 5 percent of the nation’s school-age children.
How much does mental illness cost the nation?
• In 1990 Mental Illness cost the nation an estimated $150 billion, according to the United States Alcohol, Drug Abuse and Mental Health Administration.
• Mentally ill people are feared or stereotyped as irrational, aggressive and violent. In fact, they are more likely to be isolated, passive and withdrawn. Often they are blamed for falling victim to an illness that is clearly biologically based.
• They are denied the opportunity to rebuild their lives in the community because of discrimination in housing, employment and insurance coverage.
• Through research, scientists have made great advances in understanding the nature of mental illness in the last ten years. The development of sophisticated scanning devices to take detailed “pictures” of the brain, genetic mapping to determine the causes of mental illness, and research on new medications have led to numerous breakthroughs in the last decade.
• The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is a national, grassroots self-help organization of families and friends of people with Serious Mental Illnesses, and those with mental illness. Dedicated to improving the lives of seriously mentally ill people, NAMI Began in 1979 with 254 people, and has grown to encompass 220,000 members and 1, 200 affiliate chapters nationwide. NAMI works to educate Americans about symptoms and treatment of disorders; improve treatment and access to appropriate medical therapies; reduce the stigma of mental illness; and increase scientific research in treatment approaches and neuroscience.
• Serious Mental Illnesses (SMI) interfere with employment. An estimated 57 percent of adults with SMI were not employed in 1990 compared to 29 percent of the general population.
• Approximately one-third of the estimated 600,000 homeless people of the United States have a Severe Mental Illness.
• In 1998, 283,800 people with Mental Illnesses were incarcerated in American prisons and jails.
Source: The National Institute of Mental Health
If you or someone you know would like more information on mental illness
or wish to request an educational presentation, please contact:
NAMI IOWA (National Alliance on Mental Illness)
5911 Meredith Drive Suite E
Des Moines IA 50322-1903
Phone: (515) 254-0417 or (800) 417-0417 IOWA ONLY
Fax: (515) 254-1103 Website: http://www.namiiowa.org/