Kennedy Launches Initiative to Promote Brain Research

APA has joined an impressive list of government officials, mental health advocacy groups and experts, scientists, and clinicians to launch former Congressman Patrick Kennedy's campaign to support the development of effective new treatments for neurological and mental disorders and dramatically increase funding for and coordination of brain research.

The American Psychiatric Foundation has stepped up with a $50,000 grant to support the conference that will launch the campaign, known as “The Next Frontier: One Mind for the Brain.” The conference will be hosted by the Massachusetts General Hospital Starr Center from May 23 to 25. Co-chairs Kennedy and Garen Staglin are referring to the Next Frontier campaign as a “moonshot to the mind,” and its goal is to map what Kennedy calls the “inner space of the mind” within the next decade…

During 16 years in the U.S. House of Representatives, Kennedy wrote and co-sponsored dozens of bills on issues related to mental illness and improving the lives of people with psychiatric disorders. Also, he used his position and profile to raise understanding of these disorders, including speaking openly about his own battles with mental illness and those of his family.

Read the full article by Richard Faust at Psychiatry Online
and learn more about The Next Frontier at Moonshot.org.