Why Us

The Family Center for Bipolar at Beth Israel Medical Center involves the families of our bipolar patients at every stage of care. We refer to this approach as Family-Inclusive Treatment (FIT). Our program is dedicated to improving patients' outcome and quality of life, and protecting family members - including children - from the pain, frustration, isolation, and misunderstanding that can become the norm.

FIT is an alternative to the common psychiatric practice of limiting information about the patient’s medications, psychotherapy or other treatment - to protect the privacy of the patient. Traditionally, contact with loved ones is often restricted until the patient is in crisis. However, excluding family and close others can have severe consequences.

Here are four reasons why:

• Close others are the prime source for accurate information about how the bipolar person they love and live with is behaving on a 24/7 basis. When they are excluded from the treatment process, the doctor has to rely solely on the patient's often unreliable assessment of his/her own state of mind, and timely corrective treatment initiatives may not be taken. Given this lack of reliable information, a crisis becomes inevitable.

  Excluding close others shuts down a very reliable early warning system. When caregivers are included in their loved one's treatment, they learn to recognize and report early symptoms of mania and depression so that appropriate steps can be taken and hospitalization can be avoided.
   

• Loving and living with someone who has bipolar disorder is like being on a roller coaster. If you don't know what's happening or why, the stress and unhappiness may drive you, the close other, to get off the roller coaster in order to save yourself and your children - even though you may still love this person, and  getting off the roller coaster may mean divorce and splintering the family unit.

  Having a parent with bipolar disorder is very hard on children, especially when no one tells them what's wrong, what to expect, and how to act or react. Breaking up the family is rarely the optimal solution.
   

• When a bipolar patient in crisis and has to be hospitalized, his or her prognosis worsens. This is unfortunate, as most crises can be avoided by educating and involving close others in the patient’s care. Thus, isolation and worse alienation from loved ones lessens the possibilities for successful recovery and future brighter days. 
   

• Finally, bipolar illness is, in part, hereditary. Under stress, children of a bipolar parent are at increased risk of having a depressive or manic episode.

  As you have probably experienced, stress often either originates in the family or can be relieved by family support.

For all of these reasons family participation is critical for the delivery of the best possible care and can improve prognosis.