In San Francisco, where the famed Golden Gate Bridge is the scene of more suicides than any other in the world, a conscious decision was made to substitute the cable car as the image for this year's annual meeting, said Dr. Nada Stotland, president of the American Psychiatric Association. On Saturday, 17,000 psychiatrists from 100 countries started arriving for the 162nd meeting with 400 sessions under the banner of "Science and Service."

This has been a tough year for the image of psychiatry as a result of considerable media attention to prominent psychiatrists with ties to industry. In response to a question at a morning briefing, Stotland outlined the ways in which the association started separating education from marketing initiatives before senate investigations spearheaded by Sen. Chuck Grassley. Alluding to weekend protests from MindFreedom International and Scientologists, she also said psychiatry was only one of the medical specialties to use medication. MindFreedom's annual Mad Pride celebration was recently featured in Newsweek Magazine.

Alcohol Abuse
New research into addictive disorders is a prominent theme this year. Alcohol plays a role in about half of all suicides, said Dr. Mark Willenbring, from the National Institute on Alcohol and Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). Findings based on 43,000 households alters previous conceptual frameworks of alcohol use which had been based on the experience of people coming to treatment from Skid Row. Willenbring described a pattern in which a 3-4 year period of drinking applied to about 72% raising questions how new concepts for risk and treatment should evolve.

Watch for frequent posts (through Thursday) from the halls of the Moscone Convention Center.