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STATEMENT of Kurt Entsminger

New executive director of the Treatment Advocacy Center as of January 2, 2008

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“The Treatment Advocacy Center has been working for more than nine years to ensure that our state laws and policies and mental illness treatment practices allow severely mentally ill people to get the treatment they desperately need, even, and oftentimes especially, when they are too ill to themselves choose treatment. Because of TAC’s vital efforts and resulting reforms, countless people across the United States have been given practical access to psychiatric treatment and help that they did not have before.

I consider it a great honor and privilege to join this effort as the new Executive Director of the Treatment Advocacy Center, only the second since the organization’s founding. In this new role, I know I inherit an organization with a strong track record and an incredibly talented and committed team of staff, as well as a wide and dedicated network of advocates from all fields and professions, many with family members who are in desperate situations brought about by a lack of needed treatment for schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.

It is my history that brought me to TAC. As a person who has struggled with bipolar disorder for many years, I understand firsthand the difference that effective treatment can make in allowing someone to function normally again. My hospitalization and subsequent and continuing treatment is the reason I’m well today.

I come to the Treatment Advocacy Center with great respect and appreciation for its work, and a particularly strong passion for its mission. TAC is making a difference in the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans who continue, without treatment, to struggle with severe brain disorders.
I was particularly drawn to this new position because of my great empathy for the hundreds of thousands of Americans who continue, without treatment, to struggle with the consequences of untreated severe brain disorders. Far too many people with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are living on our streets, are warehoused in our prisons, and unnecessarily remain at risk for violence or suicide. I believe it is time to restore common sense to a society that has literally sacrificed human sanity in the name of personal privacy and an outdated and unrealistic understanding of what constitutes true civil rights.

Under my leadership, the Treatment Advocacy Center will continue to promote common sense policies and practices to increase access to timely and humane treatment for those whose mental illness does not afford them the ability to choose help.”

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