The Balanced Mind Foundation is committed to providing parents with current information about treatments and resources that have a proven track record of success.  To learn more we sat down individually with three leading clinicians who are pioneering the charge to include your entire family in therapy.  While the approaches differ in some important respects, they all share the common goal of working with kids with bipolar disorder in an inclusive family context.  Learning about these approaches to therapy will provide parents with the information they need to seek the treatment approach that best suites the needs of their child and their family.

The Balanced Mind Foundation is committed to providing parents with current information about treatments and resources that have a proven track record of success.  To learn more we sat down individually with three leading clinicians who are pioneering the charge to include your entire family in therapy.  While the approaches differ in some important respects, they all share the common goal of working with kids with bipolar disorder in an inclusive family context.  Learning about these approaches to therapy will provide parents with the information they need to seek the treatment approach that best suites the needs of their child and their family.

The Department of Psychiatry’s Institute for Juvenile Research at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) is conducting studies in genetics, brain structure, and biochemistry to search for early biological markers of bipolar disorder. These markers are physiological changes or traits that provide evidence of the illness that can be detected even before symptoms appear in at-risk children. Early intervention can greatly reduce the symptoms that occur, and it can head off other disorders, such as substance abuse, that often develop in untreated individuals. The UIC researchers are examining medication and gene therapy as preventive treatments for children who are at risk for developing the illness.