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diagnostic symptoms across a range of psychiatric disorders.

Future editions of the DSM may evolve beyond current categories to focus on discrete behavioral phe-

notypes based on known neurocircuitry. This could improve the success of drug development efforts to
bring better options for patients.

There's also an opportunity here to address stigma. We need to educate the public that behavior-

al phenotypes are based on known biological causes just like other medical disorders.

Written by Dr. Alison McInnes, VP of Scientific Affairs at Osmind.

Ready to join the future of mental health care? Join the “Psychiatry Tomorrow”
newsletter at Osmind to get research digests and private practice strategies
delivered straight to your inbox.

Adventures in Adversity
Michael McGee, MD

I think most of us know what to do to prevent and heal from burnout, if we would
just practice what we preach to our patients!

We know, for example, that we should minimize our stress, take good care of our-
selves, get support and help, cultivate our spirituality, and heal our emotional
wounds. This includes both old wounds as well as the everyday wounds and distress that come as stand-

ard features of being a human being and engaging in the stressing and distressing work we do.

We also know we should avoid drugs and alcohol, get plenty of sleep and rest, exercise, eat healthy, med-
itate every day, have fun, live with balance, and cultivate loving connections with others.

We also all know that we should process our pain with wise and loving people.

I don’t think the problem for most of us is not knowing what to do to prevent and heal from burnout. The
problem is in doing these things.

So, the key question becomes, what is preventing us from doing what we know would help us to feel better? I
would invite you to look carefully within and see if any of the following hindrances to healing exist with-

in you:
The first hindrance to healing is unhealed trauma: Most of us went into the healing profession in part

because of our own trauma. Like everyone else, we clinicians can be vulnerable to sealing our pain to sur-

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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA PSYCHIATRIC SOCIETY Page 19 January / February 2023