AACP Newsletter, Volume 10,
Number 3, Summer 1996
Brief Notes
AACP’s Allan Beigal Dies at Age 56
Allan Beigal, an AACP member and a pioneer in Community Psychiatry, died on June 22, 1996 of brain cancer at his home in Tucson, Arizona.
Dr. Beigal was born in Hamilton, Ohio and graduated from Harvard College and from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in 1965. He moved to Tucson in 1970 and joined the faculty of the University of Arizona and soon became the director of the Southern Arizona Mental Health Center, a position that he held until 1983. His academic interests included mental health policy, managed care, and education. He also developed expertise in forensic psychiatry and substance use disorders and was licensed to practice medicine in five states. In 1983 he was appointed as a vice president of the University of Arizona, and had a distinguished career as an academic administrator until the time of his illness.
Those who knew him describe a man of high energy and diverse interests. He always appeared to be doing several things at once, and generally did all of them well. His death is a great loss for the AACP as he was one of the great community psychiatrists of the 1970’s. He will be missed by many. Dr. Beigal is survived by his wife and four daughters.
AACP Authors Active in 1996
Two new books have been or will be released in 1996 edited by AACP board members. Already released is Practicing Psychiatry in the Community: A Manual. The book is edited by Gordon Clark, MD (AACP founding President) and Jerome Vaccarro, MD (AACP founding board member) and is published by the American Psychiatric Press, Inc. The book contains chapters by many active AACP members and covers a broad range of topics related to community psychiatry.
The second book will be released shortly and is entitled Managed Mental Health Care in the Public Sector: A Survival Manual. The book is part of a series on Chronic Mental Illness and is edited by
David Pollack, MD
and
Ken Minkoff, MD
. It is published by Harwood Academic Publishers, and the series editor is John Talbot, MD. The authors represent a wide range of views, areas of expertise and background experience, and many of the chapters include survival tips for clinicians and administrators. The book takes a positive approach to the possibilities created by the changes occurring in public systems and provides guidance in maximizing opportunities for success while maintaining humanistic ideals in this environment.
AMSA Student Rep Reports on the AACP
Alexander Isaac has served this year as the AMSA representative to the AACP Board of Directors. He attended the Winter Meeting in Seattle and had an opportunity to become acquainted with many AACP activities. In his recent report on his activities in this capacity to AMSA, he made the following observations:
“Of the physicians that I have met, I have been impressed by their dedication and conscientiousness as physicians and citizens. They are fulfilled by their work with their chronically mentally ill, poor, and disenfranchised patients. Their primary reward is the service they provide to these patients. Perpetually underfunded, their outlook is concrete and realistic and their approach to health care is resourceful and practical. A holistic, patient centered view has always been at the heart of community psychiatry because every aspect of patients’ lives impacts directly on treatment outcome, i.e. housing, stable emotional relations in the health care climate. Community psychiatrists are veterans of economic and political chaos. Funding for community mental health care has always been subject to the ups and downs of politics and bureaucracies.”“The multi-disciplinary model of and team centered health care has always been a feature of community psychiatry. The nature of the work requires the active participation of not only the psychiatric nurses, technicians, psychologists, and social workers, but also the active participation of the families and communities that are ultimately the primary care givers.”
It can sincerely be said that if other students can be reached and encouraged to develop some part of the understanding that Mr. Isaac articulates here, then the future of community psychiatry is in good hands. We are very pleased by the relationship that we have so far developed with AMSA under the leadership of Ken Thompson, MD, and look forward to continuing contact with this group.
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