Improving knowledge about mental illness through family-led education: the journey of hope.

Objective: Families often do not receive the information that they need to care for their adult relatives with mental illness. This study examined the effectiveness of a family-led education intervention, the Journey of Hope, in improving participants' knowledge about mental illness and its treatment and decreasing their information needs.

Methods: A total of 462 family members of adults with mental illness in Louisiana participated in the study; 231 were randomly assigned to immediate receipt of the Journey of Hope course (intervention group), and 231 were randomly assigned to a nine-month waiting list for the course (control group).

The tipping point from private practice to publicly funded settings for early- and mid-career psychiatrists.

Objective: Practice settings for American psychiatrists were examined for recent trends.

Methods: Surveys were conducted in 1996 (N=970) and 2002 (N=917) among members of the American Psychiatric Association.

Results: Between 1996 and 2002 the percentage of direct patient care hours in publicly funded settings increased from 40 to 50 percent for early-career psychiatrists and from 29 to 44 percent for mid-career psychiatrists.