…the first, Learning Empathy by Looking Beyond Disabilities is an account of a program initiated at Ridgewood High School that seeks to create empathy and understanding between teens with and without special needs. I think this is something that could be easily transferable to our community, so I’d love to hear your thoughts.

The second, Expert on Mental Illness Reveals Her Own Fight, was a front page article about a prominent psychologist and researcher who has developed an approach to therapy for those who are at risk for suicide — it is based on her own struggles, and it’s a very inspiring testimony. Moreover, it underscores that slowly, but surely, mental illness is coming out of the closet, and it’s stories like these that are pushing it along. There’s an excellent companion piece by Tara Parker Pope that I’ve also included.

Bernards Township Municipal Alliance is scheduling upcoming neighborhood coffees, which will focus on the topic of teen drinking, carrying the theme “It’s 21 for a Reason“.  Here’s a fantastic article in today’s WSJ that speaks to that exact topic and also discusses some of the neurophysiologic changes that can occur in young brains due to immoderate drinking.

In addition to posting this article on bernardsvoices.org, this is an article that I wanted to send to all of you directly both because it has a distinctly “Y” focus and points so clearly to the kind of impact we can have through our HOP initiatives, including Mental Health Week, the NJ MentalHealthCares Help Line and soon, Mental Health First Aid, throughout the community.

Amy Gardner, in the January 11th The Washington Post, profiles the Pima, Arizona YMCA, where three of the most noted victims of the recent Tucson shootings were members.   Their lives probably intersected many, many times during the course of their visits to the Y — one was a swimmer, one a dancer, and one a volunteer board member.   But here’s the kicker — Jared Loughner, the shooting suspect, also spent time at that Y.  Stop for a moment and think about that….what if….

• … there had been greater awareness in that community of the signs and symptoms of mental illness?
• … people knew enough about mental illness through training and education not to be afraid to offer assistance?
• … there had been a number posted — at the Y, in schools, in churches, restaurants and in other public places — for a Help Line that could have provided counsel and guidance to someone who observed concerning behavior?
• … there were people trained in Mental Health First Aid who could have identified a potential problem and directed the distressed individual or a family member to help?

Yes, I know these are a lot of very big “what ifs”, but these statements reflect what we are trying to achieve through our work with HOP. I also know that it’s very likely that the young man who committed this awful attack would have done it no matter how much kindness had been shown him or what intervention had been put before him. But I firmly believe, and I know that you share this belief, that greater awareness, understanding, compassion, access to services and one-on-one interaction can make a difference in peoples’ lives, especially those who are suffering from mental illness. I am proud to be working with each of you to make this a reality in our community.

This is a very powerful article (and there’s a video that goes with it). Would love to hear your thoughts and comments. Special thanks to the Y’s VP of Human Resources, Kerra French, for bringing this to my attention.

Thank you for all you do and best wishes,
Lauren

A nationwide survey of college freshmen found that their emotional health had fallen to the lowest level since the poll was introduced a quarter century ago.

Some 52% of first-year college students rated their emotional health as above average or in the highest 10% in the survey taken last fall. That’s down from 55.3% in the year-earlier survey, and well below the nearly 64% of respondents who gave themselves high ratings in 1985, the first year students were asked about their emotional health.

The “Freshman Survey,” administered by UCLA’s Higher Education Research Institute, encompasses responses from more than 200,000 first-year, full-time students at nearly 280 U.S. colleges and universities. The survey, which also asks a host of other questions, is well regarded among college administrators, partly because the response rate usually exceeds 90%.

College administrators said the survey is likely to add force to an ongoing effort to bolster mental-health services on campus. “The trend has been more students coming to college who either have been diagnosed with mental health issues or who are proactive at seeking out help,” says Anne Dueweke, director of institutional research at Kalamazoo College in Michigan.

Best regards,
Lauren

For us to create widespread community awareness and ultimately, usage, of the NJ MentalHealthCares Help Line beyond the walls of the YMCA, it is important that we mount a grassroots education campaign in our churches, schools, and among other key community-based organizations. Stephanie Mulfinger, coordinator of the Help Line for the Mental Health Association in New Jersey, is willing to meet individually with decision makers and/or make a presentation to groups about the Help Line, to provide the level of information and reassurance that some organizations may need before widely publicizing the number/ service to constituents/ students/ members/ clients.

Our goal is to lay the foundation for community acceptance at a grassroots level for the Help Line by the time we officially launch it at the Y and throughout our community in March.
http://www.njmentalhealthcares.org

Stephanie Mulfinger, LCSW, Coordinator, NJ MentalHealthCares Help Line, MHANJ
973-571-4100 X-121
smulfinger@mhanj.org

I ask each member to reach out to Stephanie as soon as possible; not only can she speak to your organization, she can provide professional looking posters (with business cards attached) and leaflets that feature the number and information about the service.  Already HOP representatives from Bernards and Ridge high schools, the Bernards Township Dept. of Health, a local pastors group, the Visiting Nurse Association, the Municipal Alliance, the NJ Restaurant Association, etc., have volunteered to seek ways of exposing their respective consituencies to the NJ MentalHealthCares Help Line number.

For those of you who were not at the meeting, but may be aware of other opportunities within your own organization or elsewhere, will you please let us know? For example the police departments in Bernardsville and Bernards Township; not only the highs schools but the middle and elementary schools; township sports leagues…all these would be important venues/forums for education about the Help Line and for the number to be posted and made available.

Thanks to each of you for doing your part to get out the word about this important first-call mental health resource, and to Stephanie and the MHANJ for their professionalism and support!

Best regards,
Lauren Luik

The second article Feeling Warehoused in Army’s Trauma Care Units: GIs Depict Life of Pills and Isolation, relates to the Mental Health Week presentation, “Time and Again: Reliving Trauma”, which will feature talks by Corporal Justen Townsend of the US Marines and Stefan Neustadter, MSW, LCSW, who has worked with military veterans for more than 30 years. Brenda Forte, LCSW, a specialist in the most current treatments for trauma, is also part of the presentation which is scheduled for Wednesday, May 12, at 1:00 pm. The article offers a disturbing portrait of the Warrior Transition Battalion in Colorado Springs, where, again, the emphasis appears to be on prescribing medication rather than providing needed support and counseling.

In the first article, Daniel Carlatt writes:

over the course of the decade following my residency, my way of thinking about patients had veered away from psychological curiosity. Instead, I had come to focus on symptoms, as if they were objective medical findings, much the way internists view blood-pressure readings or potassium levels. Psychiatry, for me and many of my colleagues, had become a process of corralling patients’ symptoms into labels and finding a drug to match.

Leon Eisenberg, an early pioneer in psychopharmacology at Harvard, once made the notable historical observation that “in the first half of the 20th century, American psychiatry was virtually ‘brainless.’ . . . In the second half of the 20th century, psychiatry became virtually ‘mindless.’ ”

Forces [other than modern Psychiatric training] are at work as well. Insurance companies typically encourage short medication visits by paying nearly as much for a 20-minute medication visit as for 50 minutes of therapy. And patients themselves vote with their feet by frequently choosing to see psychopharmacologists rather than therapists. Weekly therapy takes time and is arduous work. If a daily pill can cure depression and anxiety just as reliably, why not choose this option?

In studies by Helen Mayberg, a professor of psychiatric neurology at Emory University, depressed patients given cognitive behavior therapy showed decreased activity in the frontal lobe, the brain center that might be responsible for the overmagnification of life’s problems that leads to depression in some patients. And they showed increased brain activity in parts of the limbic system, a brain region associated with strong emotion. But Mayberg found that when patients were given medication, their brain activities changed in the opposite direction, stimulating the frontal lobe and damping down the limbic system. “Our imaging results suggest that you can correct the depression network along a variety of pathways,” she said.

For the first time ever, the Somerset Hills YMCA is joining with the Healthy Outcomes Partnership (HOP) to present a full five days of presentations on a broad range of topics related to achieving mental and emotional health and well-being. And, it’s absolutely free and open to the entire community. Nearly 30 national and local experts in behavioral health, family/couple dynamics, child and teen development and elder care will provide current information and resources to attendees at more than 20 presentations that will be conducted at various times throughout the week at the Somerset Hills YMCA, 140 Mt. Airy Road, Basking Ridge.

For a full schedule of Mental Health Week events and more information about the Healthy Outcomes Partnership, go to www.somersethillsymca.org/hop

As it turns out, I opened the Science Times section of The New York Times this morning — it is entirely devoted to helping consumers decipher the new health care legislation from both a policy and clinical standpoint; I highly recommend checking the whole section out on line if you can’t pick up a copy. And, lo and behold, there’s an excellent article entitled “Mental Health Experts Applaud Focus on Parity”. The focus is two-fold: the mental health care parity laws that will go into effect this July, providing that coverage for mental health treatments can be no more restrictive than for medical and surgical treatment; and how health reform will amplify these new parity laws to the benefit of those who need treatment for mental illnesses.

See related post on Obama administration rules for a single deductible.

A key difference between ordinary teen angst and depression is how long the “angst” lasts and the effect this mood has on the teen experiencing it. For example, if a young person’s mood seems to be affecting his or her ability to engage in family and school activities and peer relationships and is coupled with physical symptoms such difficulty eating and/or sleeping for a period of at least two weeks or longer, it is worthwhile to seek outside help.

Robert Pear in the January 30, 2010 The New York Times reported:

Insurers cannot set higher co-payments and deductibles or stricter limits on treatment for mental illness and addiction disorders. Nor can they establish separate deductibles for mental health care and for the treatment of physical illnesses.

The administration said the new requirements could increase premiums by four-tenths of 1 percent, or $25.6 billion over 10 years. Businesses with 50 or fewer employees are exempt.

The government said the rules would benefit 111 million people in 446,400 group health plans offered by private employers, and 29 million people in 20,000 plans sponsored by state and local governments.