The Problem
Mental disorders increasingly contribute to the global burden of disease, with huge socio-economic costs (Catalá-López et al., 2013; Whiteford et al., 2013). However, research and development in psychopharmacology—psychiatry's primary mode of intervention—came to a halt in 2010 (Miller, 2010; Hyman, 2013). Approval of new molecular entities for psychiatric conditions by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) fell from 13 in 1996 to one in 2016, with 49 approved between 1996 and 2006 and 22 from 2007 to 20161 In pharmacology conferences in the period, just about 5% of presentations were dedicated to human studies involving drugs with novel mechanisms of action (van Gerven and Cohen, 2011). These occurrences are part of a complex picture clearly dissected as a triple crisis in psychiatry: of therapeutics, diagnostics and explanation (Rose, 2016).
Mental disorders increasingly contribute to the global burden of disease, with huge socio-economic costs (Catalá-López et al., 2013; Whiteford et al., 2013). However, research and development in psychopharmacology—psychiatry's primary mode of intervention—came to a halt in 2010 (Miller, 2010; Hyman, 2013). Approval of new molecular entities for psychiatric conditions by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) fell from 13 in 1996 to one in 2016, with 49 approved between 1996 and 2006 and 22 from 2007 to 20161 In pharmacology conferences in the period, just about 5% of presentations were dedicated to human studies involving drugs with novel mechanisms of action (van Gerven and Cohen, 2011). These occurrences are part of a complex picture clearly dissected as a triple crisis in psychiatry: of therapeutics, diagnostics and explanation (Rose, 2016).