(Sept. 19, 2017) Treat or Repeat, released today by the Treatment Advocacy Center, marks the ninth state survey conducted and written by founder E. Fuller Torrey, MD.
Dr. Torrey began generating state surveys before the formation of the Treatment Advocacy Center with Care of the Seriously Mentally Ill: A Rating of State Programs in 1986. A joint publication by Public Citizen Health Research Group and National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), this report was updated in 1988 and 1990. Dr. Torrey's criteria and methods continued to be used by NAMI for their popular Grading of the States released in 2006 and 2009.
Dr. Torrey also conducted and wrote the first three out of four Treatment Advocacy Center psychiatric bed surveys. These census surveys required him to individually collect state psychiatric bed numbers throughout the United States via telephone calls to state officials. They produced the only complete national totals of state psychiatric hospital bed numbers and have been cited throughout the world.
Treat or Repeat marks the third state survey on the criminalization of mental illness by Dr. Torrey. Criminalizing the Seriously Mentally Ill: The Abuse of Jails as Mental Hospitals, released in 1992, was the result of surveying all 1,391 local jails in the country on the prevalence of serious mental illness in jails. The Treatment of Persons with Mental Illness in Prisons and Jails: A State Survey, released in 2014, was the first national survey of mental health treatment practices in jails and prisons.
These surveys fill crucial information gaps, call attention to failures within the mental health system and recommend solutions.
Treat or Repeat: A State Survey of Serious Mental Illness, Major Crimes, and Community Treatment is the latest undertaking by Dr. Torrey to gather and report on information not collected by any government agency or national organization.
Elizabeth Sinclair
Research Associate
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Research Weekly is a summary published as a public service of the Treatment Advocacy Center and does not necessarily reflect the findings or positions of the organization or its staff. Full access to research summarized may require a fee or paid subscription to the publications.
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