Forty Years of Academic Public Psychiatry

The Connecticut Mental Health Center is a collaboration of the State of Connecticut, through its Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, and Yale University, through its Medical School and Department of Psychiatry. The unique connection between the state and university means that the Center naturally attends to the mental health needs of the public, while at the same time conducting studies to learn about psychiatric illness and educating students of the mental health professions.The Center is located in a medium sized, urban setting and annually offers safety-net services to 5000 individuals, who have serious mental illnesses and addictions. Many of them have disabilities, co-occurring disorders, and legal problems. Also, many require supportive, residential and rehabilitative services in order to live in the community. The Center's clinical programs designed to address these problems range from acute hospitalization services to ambulatory services, as well as special outreach programs for homeless individuals and those who are not able to come to the Center. Additionally, in satellite clinics, the Center offers substance use treatment, care to monolingual Latinos, and special services for young adults.The Center is the lead agency for a network of 16 community-based agencies that provide vocational and psychosocial rehabilitation, residential services, case management, support services, and education for families. By integrating these rehabilitative and support services with treatment interventions, the Center is dedicated to recovery in the community.The Center is home to a spectrum of academic programs related to its clinical services. Academic pursuits include programs on chronic illness, recovery, addictions, law and psychiatry, neurobiology, services evaluation, epidemiology, prevention, and cultural diversity. Each of the academic programs has both research and educational components that are carried out under the aegis of the Yale University Department of Psychiatry. The Center's medical and professional staff members are also full-time members of the Department of Psychiatry.Jacobs, Selby is the author of 'Forty Years of Academic Public Psychiatry', published 2008 under ISBN 9780470987674 and ISBN 0470987677.