What exactly is the difference between a neurological illness of the brain and a mental illness?

Question

What exactly is the difference between a neurological illness of the brain and a mental illness?

In: Other

Answer 1

Mental illness is a “functional problem”, meaning that there may not be anything physically wrong with the brain, but the function is still impeded.

Neurological illness is a “physical problem”, as in there is something wrong with the brain (or other nervous) tissue (or its metabolism, or its blood supply etc) leading to problems depending on where in the brain the problem is.

There is overlap; chronic mental illness can cause the brain to develop physical (or *organic* as the official term goes) problems. And neurological illnesses often lead to mental issues.