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Partnerships within the Veterans Health Administration and the Veterans Benefits Administration’s Office of Transition and Economic Development, are actively providing, through the Joint Action Plan, transitioning service members with the opportunity to register for VA health care pre-transition during the Transition Assistance Program. This is a new option for service members, who before were provided with information for independent registration, however, were not provided with the opportunity for facilitated registration.

“In a single month, more than 34 percent of the nearly 8,000 transitioning service members who attended the TAP modules in person registered for VA health care before, during or after their class attendance date,” Franklin said. “One of the joint goals of this effort is to reduce barriers to care. By getting transitioning service members registered into the VA health care system earlier, we are able to get them the mental health care they need much quicker.”

The TAP curriculum is also modified to incorporate a new military lifecycle module on community integration resources. This module informs transitioning service members about community organizations as well as how to identify and check them.

“Because of the updates to TAP, 81 percent of the transitioning service members in TAP during the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2018 said they felt informed about the mental health services available to them,” Franklin said. “This modification reinforces the important role of community partners, such as Veteran Service Organizations.

Emergent mental health care available to more service members than ever before

Through the coordinated efforts of DoD, DHS, and VA, certain former service members may receive emergent mental health care from VA. Additionally, any newly transitioned Veteran who is eligible can go to a VA medical center, Vet Center, or community provider and start receiving health care right away.

As part of the effort to provide mental and behavioral health care, VA is using telemental health technology to reach those service members who may not have easy access to a VA facility and implementing eligibility training for employees at the field level.

“Mental health care is something that we want to make available as widely as possible,” said Dr. David Carroll, executive director, Office of Mental Health and Suicide Prevention. “The efforts under this executive order are one way that we can make that happen. We have the greatest respect for the men and women who have served in our nation’s armed forces, and we will not relent in our efforts to connect those who are experiencing an emotional or mental health crisis with lifesaving support.”

Read more at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

Suicide is the second leading cause of death for youths aged 15 to 24, yet only about half of young adults with a mental disorder receive treatment. In an effort to address this disparity and further conversations about mental health among high schoolers, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) invites students ages 16 to 18 years old to participate in the “Speaking Up About Mental Health!” essay contest. Essays should explore ways to address the stigma and social barriers that adolescents from racial and ethnic minority populations may face when seeking mental health treatment. The contest is led by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), in collaboration with the Calvin J. Li Memorial Foundation, and the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD). NIMH and NIMHD are components of NIH.

“Teens have important stories to tell about their experiences with mental health treatment, and we hope this contest will give them an opportunity to express their thoughts and ideas. It’s clear we need to work with them to better understand mental health stigma and the barriers they may face when seeking mental health treatment,” said Joshua Gordon, M.D., Ph.D., director of NIMH.

Ideas for essay topics could include:

• Creative ways to start a conversation about mental health or related stigma
• Innovative approaches to remove, reduce, or lower barriers to mental health treatment
• Suggested changes in school policies or practices that could help reduce stigma
• Other areas of concern to individuals and their communities with respect to mental health

This contest was started as part of the Healthy Mind Initiative, which aims to increase mental health awareness and promote suicide prevention in Asian American and Pacific Islander youth, although the contest is open to all high school youths nationwide. The goal of the initiative is to reach a population that may view mental health care negatively, or may not consider it at all, due to stigma, lack of awareness and education, or differences in cultural conceptualization of mental health.

Read more on NIH.gov.

Learn more and submit your essays at Challenge.gov.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR) is seeking comment and input from the research and health/public health communities to help inform a list of impactful public health and healthcare accomplishments/contributions resulting from behavioral and social sciences research (BSSR). Follow this link to view how NIH defines BSSR. Note: This BSSR accomplishments list will be broad and will not be limited to NIH-funded research. 

OBSSR is using IdeaScale to make it easy to submit to this list of accomplishments. (Once an IdeaScale account is created, a user can submit comments, browse and respond to comments that have already been submitted, and vote for their favorites.) Your feedback will be used to make the list of accomplishments as meaningful as possible and to communicate the significance of BSSR. OBSSR wants your input!

The deadline to participate in this BSSR accomplishments crowdsource is Wednesday, July 31, 2019 at midnight EDT.

Learn more and contribute your accomplishments at OBSSR.ideascale.com.

Most people know that physical activity can reduce risk for heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and other chronic diseases, but fewer know that it is also important for mental health. Research suggests that exercise and physical activity can help to improve symptoms of anxiety and depression. People of color, particularly youth, are less likely to be physically active compared to Whites and, in general, as people get older they exercise less. Since the U.S. population is becoming more racially diverse, more people are at risk for inactivity. April was National Minority Health Month, led by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health. Recognizing the risks of inactivity, the theme this year was “Active and Healthy.”

In keeping with this year’s theme, SAMHSA is promoting efforts for communities to get “active and healthy” through the National Network to Eliminate Disparities in Behavioral Health (NNED). Nearly 100 NNED members took their first steps together in the Office of Minority Health’s Active and Healthy Challenge at this year’s NNEDLearn 2019 training.

NNEDLearn 2019 included instruction on two interventions, Preventing Long-term Anger and Aggression in Youth (PLAAY) and Project Venture, which incorporate physical activity into efforts to promote mental health and resilience for youth of color.  PLAAY is an intervention aimed for Black male youth that uses Recast Theory (Racial Encounter Coping Appraisal and Socialization Theory) to promote mental health and the development of healthy coping skills for Black male youth through youth athletics. Project Venture is an experiential youth development program tailored for American Indian/Alaska Native Youth at high risk for substance use and related problems. These evidence-based interventions are geared to youth exposed to trauma and violence in their communities.

Read more on SAMHSA.gov.

This article was written by and from the perspective of licensed social worker, speaker and writer Minaa B.

I remember the barren look in my mother’s eyes when I told her I was diagnosed with depression and was also taking medication to treat it. It was as if the words that had left my lips were too weighty for her to carry. Full of too much pain for her to even try to digest because it might make her sick to her stomach and upset the taste of truth.

This is my story, but it’s also the story of many black women. Women with mahogany skin are constantly having to hide their pain because they are told that it’s too much, too serious, too exaggerated. I had always been told and taught that my pain could go away if I worked a little harder, slept a little later, ate a little more, or complained a little less. Being depressed while wrapped in black skin is difficult not only for my kin, but for the society that I live in.

Someone asked me once if I think progress is being made to reduce the stigma surrounding mental health in our society. I didn’t know how to answer. One part of me believes the answer is yes, we are making progress. Yes, because years ago, the word depression seemed a little dirty. Like it was a foreign language that only the hurt and broken understood. But now people are having open conversations about depression and anxiety. Celebrities are openly talking about going to rehab, not just for drugs, but for emotional stability. Wellness blogs are flooding the market, giving space for folks to have conversations about trauma, eating disorders, even suicide, and also putting on events for people to have a safe space to openly receive and give advice on mental health and wellness. I think all of this is beautiful. I think all of this is necessary. But I also think there’s something missing.

Which is why the other part of me felt the answer is no. No, because I have come to realize that whenever I’m in spaces talking about my depression, my past with cutting, my mental health, they’re white spaces. I am always the only black girl on the panel. I am always the only black guest speaker. I am always locking eyes with the one or two black girls in the audience full of white women, letting them know that they are seen and heard.

I also believe real progress toward erasing mental health stigma requires more than a discussion; it’s about resources and access. When we talk about mental health and we talk about eating balanced meals, sustaining an exercise regimen, and seeking out holistic doctors and therapists, we also have to take into account classism and how there is a whole population of people who still lack access to grocery stores that provide fresh and affordable foods.

The neighborhood in which I currently live is flooded with delis, liquor stores, and fast food restaurants. To get to the nearest Trader Joe’s, one needs a vehicle. To have access to quality doctors, one needs quality insurance. What this shows me is that mental health is moving in a direction that serves a certain group of people while so many others are still waiting to have a seat at the table. Too often, black and brown people still have to prove themselves good enough to speak on panels, to educate in classrooms, and, most importantly, to be seen as people who are also affected by mental health and illness rather than as thugs and black girls with bad attitudes.

Read more on WellandGood.com. 

Only a small percentage of youth who report pain reliever (including opioid) abuse or dependence receive addiction treatment, and youth of color are significantly less likely to receive treatment than their white peers. According to Child Trends’ analysis of the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, this gap between white youth and youth of color age 21 and under has persisted almost every year since 2002, when opioid prescription deaths began to rise. As of 2016, 16.1 percent of white youth who abused pain relievers received treatment, compared to 16.7 percent in 2002. Just 9.5 percent of youth of color who abused pain relievers received treatment in 2016—a 4.3 percentage point drop from 2002 (when 13.8 percent received treatment) and persistently lower than their white counterparts.

In the Child Trends analysis, youth of color includes black, Hispanic, Native American, Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, Asian, and multiracial youth; these groups were combined due to small sample sizes, which is regrettable since each group’s experiences in attempting to access treatment are different.

During the period from 2002 to 2016, some positive steps were taken; overall, though, these do not seem to be associated with either increases in the percentage of youth receiving addiction treatment or with closing the gap between white youth and youth of color. These positive steps include increased government spending on substance abuse during the Great Recession, largely through Medicaid. It’s possible that this increase temporarily closed the gap between white youth and youth of color because most government spending was on Medicaid and nearly 60 percent of nonelderly Medicaid enrollees were people of color in 2008. The Affordable Care Act (ACA), passed in 2010, also increased insurance coverage among youth, but research has found that the ACA did not increase substance abuse treatment among young people.

Read more on ChildTrends.org.