Reinventing the E.R. for America’s Mental-Health Crisis

Plus: Peak Therapy on TV; how actors are paid in the streaming era; and Milan Kundera. View in browser | Update your preferences Wednesday, July 12, 2023 In today’s newsletter, a new psychiatric protocol, and then: • How we reached Peak Therapy on TV • A celebrity wolf’s journey through Europe • Who made money from “Orange Is the New Black”? Reinventing the E.R. for America’s Mental-Health Crisis EmPATH units are advancing a radically new approach to psychiatric emergencies. It seems to be working. Photograph by Brian Ulrich for The New Yorker One in eight patients who arrive at an emergency room is there for a behavioral crisis such as psychosis, suicidality, mania, aggression, or substance use. But as the physician and writer Dhruv Khullar explains in a new report, published as part of this week’s Therapy Issue, “in some cases, showing up at an E.R. can make things worse; patients who pose a danger to themselves or others may be sedated or kept in isolation, even tethered to bedside rails so that they cannot move.” Khullar travels to a suburb of Minneapolis to get a firsthand look at a hospital that is doing things differently, one of the country’s few dozen Emergency Psychiatry Assessment, Treatment, and Healing units, where five thousand patients in the past two years have been given “a calm communal environment where they can receive a comprehensive evaluation, start therapy, and, if needed, receive medication.” These units could be the future of crisis treatment—if we are willing to allocate the resources, and health systems are prepared to broaden their ideas about care. Read the story Support The New Yorker’s award-winning journalism. Subscribe today » Culture Dept. The New Yorker Interview We Have Reached Peak “Therapy TV” As part of this week’s special digital issue, three critics discuss the changing role of the therapist on television, from “Frasier” and “The Sopranos” to “Shrinking” and “Couples Therapy.” By Inkoo Kang, Alexandra Schwartz, and Doreen St. Félix The Therapy Issue: Merve Emre on transference in the classroom; Jean Garnett on life as a twin; cartoons from our archive; and more new pieces publishing all week. Explore the issue » From the News Desk Annals of a Warming Planet Vermont’s Catastrophic Floods and the Spread of Unnatural Disasters In parts of the Northeast, two months of rain fell in two days. By Sue Halpern From the Archive The Czech novelist Milan Kundera died yesterday at the age of ninety-four. “Seems hard today to explain what ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’ was for twenty years: a formally fresh, playful literary novel by an Eastern Bloc writer that it sometimes seemed every nineteen-year-old in the world had read,” the New Yorker staff writer Nathan Heller tweeted, referencing Kundera’s signature novel, which was excerpted in the magazine in 1984. Fiction “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” “He remained annoyed with himself until he realized that not knowing what he wanted was actually quite natural.” By Milan Kundera Editor’s Pick Notes on Hollywood “Orange Is the New Black” Signalled the Rot Inside the Streaming Economy The innovative and daring show was a worldwide hit for Netflix, but some of the actors say that they were never fairly compensated. By Michael Schulman Screening Room The New Yorker Documentary “Naya” Reconstructs a Celebrity Wolf’s Journey Through Europe In this short documentary, a wild animal finds new territory that’s rife with prey and with human conflict. Film by Sebastian Mulder Text by Sarah Chatta Fun & Games Dept. Name Drop Play Today’s Quiz Can you guess the notable person in six clues or fewer? By Will Nediger Daily Shouts Exciting New Plotlines for “And Just Like That . . .” Charlotte tries to attend a virtual N.F.T. show in person. Che explains what pegging is, for the third time. Carrie regrets buying linen pants. By Arielle Zibrak Crossword A Lightly Challenging Puzzle “Dancing Queen” band: four letters. By Elizabeth C. Gorski Daily Cartoon Wednesday, July 12th By Brendan Loper P.S. As Wimbledon enters its final stages, it’s a good time to read a novel about an imagined tennis match in 1599 between the poet Francisco de Quevedo and the painter Caravaggio. The book, Louisa Thomas writes, “is too much—too meta, too decadent, too scattered, too clever—but mostly, it’s too short.” It’s just one of many that New Yorker writers are reading this summer. Today’s newsletter was written by Ian Crouch. Thanks for reading. Let us know your thoughts about today’s edition. Plus, browse more newsletters and invite a friend to sign up for The Daily. You’re receiving this e-mail because you signed up for The Daily from The New Yorker. Manage your preferences | View our Privacy Policy | Unsubscribe Copyright © Condé Nast 2023. One World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007. All rights reserved.