What There Is to Go on

We often meet young people at their existential nadir—families in crisis. Many questions abound. Whether due to a manic episode and the storm that entails, following a suicide attempt, or in the throes of psychosis, in crisis, people turn to us. What we offer, whether to prevent such moments—or worse—from occurring again is of life and death importance. Consider, for example, the prospective observational analysis by Schoenbaum et al.² of commercially insured young people (age 16–30) who had a first episode psychosis (FEP). This analysis found that in the year following FEP, mortality rates in these young people were 24 times higher than same-age peers and 89 times higher than the general population; few of these young people and families received adequate therapy, and even fewer filled prescriptions for neuroleptics.