Years of research has addressed one of more effective approaches designed to help adults manage the symptoms of serious mental illness. A study conducted 20 years ago discovered that few agencies were aware of or implemented research informed approaches. One effort to address the science to practice gap was to identify symptom management related approaches and cobble them together into a comprehensive illness management and recovery program, giving birth to the Wellness Self-Management Program. WSM has been implemented in New York State since 2002, with high rates of success. In order to fufill the demand of Chinese patients with severe mental illness, the P.E.A.R.L. Institute took over the C-WSM initiative, integrating Chinese medicine and traditional Chinese therapy into a Western framework.

The general principles of C-WSM are based on the original English WSM handbook and the previously translated Chinese version, condensing 57 lessons of the original Wellness Self-Management handbook into…