Endorsements
“Dr James Lake is the maverick the field of psychiatry needs. As manifested in his latest book, Dr. Lake provides a refreshing and positive perspective on how to transform mental healthcare into the model it can, and should be. Patients are crying out for more integrative care, and this exemplary book provides the template for achieving such a vision.”
Jerome Sarris, MHSc, PhD, ND, Professor of Integrative Mental Health; Deputy Director, National Institute of Complementary Medicine, Health Research Institute, Western Sydney University, Principal Research Fellow, Department of Psychiatry, Melbourne University. Co-editor, Clinical Naturopathy: an evidence-based guide to practice
“Dr Lake resides on the frontier envisioning a new mental health care. In this book he outlines a practical model for assessing and treating common mental health issues with safe and effective interventions. Dr. Lakes new book, An Integrative Paradigm for Mental Healthcare: Ideas and Methods Shaping the Future, stands as a useful and well documented resource for the clinician eager to bring new tools and new ideas to their practice.”
Scott Shannon, MD Assistant Clinical Professor Department of Psychiatry, University of Colorado; Author, Mental Health for the Whole Child and Parenting the Whole Child
“The flood of advertising by pharmaceutical corporations is inescapable in American life. We continually hear that the challenges of daily living require pharmacologic intervention to smooth out the ups and downs of our existence. Largely as a consequence of this marketing blitz, one in six of us now takes psychoactive drugs, 80 percent of whom do so on a long-term basis. Even more worrisome is that psychoactive pharmaceuticals are increasingly being recommended for routine, long-term use in children.
While conceding that not all uses of medication is unwise, eminent psychiatrist Dr. James Lake charts alternatives. He shows how the healing processes that are inherent in everyone can be evoked and strengthened through non-drug alternatives. But An Integrative Paradigm for Mental Health Care is more than a call to sanity in the treatment of mental health problems; it is also a timely reexamination of what we mean by mind, consciousness, and the mental side of life. These overlooked issues are crucial to address for the stability, health, and the effective functioning of any society. That is why this book should be read widely by medical professionals and laypersons alike.”
Larry Dossey, MD; Author, One Mind: How Our Individual Mind Is Part of a Greater Consciousness and Why It Matters
“Dr. Lake’s thesis in this important volume, “Psychiatry as presently conceptualized and practiced fails to adequately address the core causes of mental illness,” strikes at the heart of the problem with mental health care today. The book offers a powerful critique of the ideology that drives today’s mental health care system: the inviolate marriage between psychiatry and pharmaceutical companies. Lake sets the stage for a brilliantly conceived analysis and offers actionable solutions. The challenge is not “does CAM work?” but—for most clinicians trained conventionally—the question is “how do I integrate CAM into my clinical practice?” Lake’s comprehensive approach answers this central question, enabling the clinician to move ahead with truly integrative and effective care for the mind and body.”
Leslie Korn, PhD, MPH, author Nutrition Essentials for Mental Health and Rhythms of Recovery
“In Dr. Lake’s new book, An Integrative Paradigm for Mental Healthcare: Ideas and Methods Shaping the Future, he continues his courageous mission to transform the current paradigm of psychiatry. Dr. Lake doesn't take sides and never blames, he simply moves beyond belief systems and negative bias and articulates an evidence-based integrative model of recovery and help for patients and families struggling with Mental illness. The research has clearly demonstrated that the current model of psychiatry has limitations and fails to function as a collaborative journey with practitioner and patient. Traditional psychiatry remains an educated guessing game of pharmaceutical choices, and dismissal of complementary and integrative therapies without knowledge of the research evidence or their clinical applications.
In a very organized thoughtful process Dr. Lake gracefully allows the reader to both understand and appreciate the challenges, complexities and desperate need to redefine our models of mental health care. Dr. Lake’s new book, An Integrative Paradigm for Mental Healthcare: Ideas and Methods Shaping the Future, is a vision of a collaborative and holistic model for integrative psychiatry.
Dr. Lake has turned on the lights and focused the lens on the therapeutic darkness of contemporary psychiatry.”
James M. Greenblatt, M.D. Chief medical officer Walden Behavioral Care, author, Finally Focused and Integrative Medicine for Alzheimer’s
“Medicine as conventionally practiced is mired in outdated science. In this book, the founder of the Caucus on Complementary and Alternative Medicine of the American Psychiatric Association calls for psychiatry to evolve from a reductionist paradigm of neurotransmitters gone awry, to a psychiatry of the future focused on healing the mind-body-spirit.”
Lila Massoumi, MD, Chair, American Psychiatric Association Caucus on Complementary and Integrative Psychiatry; Clinical Associate Professor, Department of Psychiatry, Michigan State University
“This is an important book for the future of psychiatry. It supports an evidence based compassionate approach to mental health; a middle way between blind faith and rigid dogmatism.”
Rogier Hoenders, MD, PhD, Director, Center for Integrative Psychiatry, Lentis, the Netherlands