A coordinated effort
It will take a massive collaboration among multiple stakeholders to launch the herculean process of addressing the unmet needs of all the above psychiatric disorders. This includes:
- the pharmaceutical industry (to provide the massive financial investment and R&D expertise)
- the federal government (to provide incentives)
- the FDA (to allow novel clinical trial designs)
- academic psychiatrists (to conduct research to discover the pathophysiology of psychiatric diseases)
- clinical psychiatrists (to provide consultations and advise about the clinical gaps in current psychopharmacological treatments)
- psychiatric patients (who are needed to volunteer for large-scale clinical trials).
This will be a veritable “psychiatric Manhattan Project” to advance the treatment of numerous psychiatric illnesses. The greatest benefit of discovering cures for disabling mental disorders is the evaporation of the virulent stigma that continues to plague our patients.
As for the political extremism that has corroded our society, it may be beyond pharmacologic redemption. An antidote to the “kool aid” has not yet been invented…