Mission Statement

The Institute is a collaborative partnership bringing together cutting-edge research assets with community-based treatment settings to reduce the burden of mental and addictive illnesses through:

  • Fundamental advances in basic, translational, clinical and applied research
  • New paradigms in training, education and community outreach grounded in an expanding evidence-based paradigm
  • Significant advances in quality of care through the development of outcome measures for current and future treatments
  • Innovative educational and outreach programs to develop the strongest possible advocacy platform
  • The assembly and analysis of the latest evidence-based data to help inform public policy
  • The creation of a comprehensive, confidential state wide case registry of all illnesses to enable the most advanced study of familial transmission of illness, novel genetic discoveries, and the role of environmental factors in the transmission and expression of illness.

The NIH’s “Decade of the Brain” ushered in a new era with dramatic new knowledge of the brain and its diseases.  The Rhode Island Institute for Mental Health Excellence will serve as a national model for conducting state-of-the-art bench-to-bedside research. This dovetails with the priorities newly articulated by National Institute of Mental Health Director Thomas Insel: supporting basic science discoveries; translating these discoveries into new interventions that will relieve the suffering of people with mental disorders; and ensuring that new approaches are used in populations that need them. We will thus create a unique model for a new “Decade of Translation” --- moving from “Discovery to Recovery,” rapidly integrating findings of basic research into evidenced-based practice, getting new therapeutic tools to patients who need them.  The Institute will be a national destination for individuals seeking the latest innovative treatments for mental and addictive illnesses.  In so doing, the Institute will harness the explosive growth in new science to bring breakthroughs in prevention, detection, and treatment to individuals with mental and addictive illnesses across the country.  

Click here to download a detailed version of the RIIMHE Mission Statement in pdf format.