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Inside the In SHAPE Program

Photo by Jon Gilbert Fox

The most disadvantaged group in the U.S. in terms of life expectancy is not, as most people might expect, a racial minority. It is people with serious mental illnesses. Due to a host of associated health problems—including high rates of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and breathing disorders—Americans with a serious mental illness have a life expectancy 15 to 30 years less than the rest of the population. But a program called In SHAPE that is currently being studied and refined at Dartmouth Medical School by Dr. Stephen Bartels, director of the Dartmouth Centers for Health and Aging, now offers them hope for healthier, longer lives.

For more about the In SHAPE program, which has become a national model, read the article "In SHAPE: Local pilot becomes national model" in the Winter 2011 issue of Dartmouth Medicine.

View video

• The In SHAPE Program with Dr. Stephen Bartels
  An excerpt from the Dartmouth Community Medical School Spring 2011 Series "Is Modern Society Killing Us?"

Learn more

• "Examining the Link between Obesity and Mental Illness"
  A story on In SHAPE from NHPR

Correction

In the Dartmouth Medicine article, "In SHAPE: Local pilot becomes national model" (Winter 2011), the photo caption that ran in the print edition incorrectly identified In SHAPE program participant, Tracy Bleyler (shown on treadmill in photo above), as having Down Syndrome. The Dartmouth Medicine team sincerely regrets this error and inaccurate description.

In addition, Dartmouth Medicine magazine, Dartmouth Medical School and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center strive to promote and recognize individuals by who they are and the work they are accomplishing rather than by a condition, or in this case, an inaccurate label.