News

More than 5 million American adults were receiving mental health treatment at a state-monitored mental health facility in 2022, according to a report from the Department of Health and Human Services released in April, an increase from last year.

However, access to treatment can largely depend on where someone lives or what kind of insurance they have. More than half of adults receiving treatment lived in just 10 states, as many Americans lack access to mental health care.

People who live in rural states have high rates of people receiving mental health services at state-monitored facilities. Isolation, diminishing economic prospects, and the stigmatization of mental health conditions can lead to higher rates of depression in rural communities. In Iowa, where about one-third of its population lives in rural areas, an estimated 473,000 people have a mental health condition. However, the state ranked last in terms of psychiatric bed availability, with only 2 available beds per 100,000 residents.

Read more at DerbyInformer.com

In recognition of National Minority Mental Health Month, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s (SAMHSA) Office of Behavioral Health Equity (OBHE), in collaboration with the National Asian American Pacific Islander Mental Health Association (NAAPIMHA), invites you to join a webinar:

Community Approaches to Counter Hate: Introducing HEART Resources

Thursday, July 25, 2024
3:00 pm – 4:30 pm EDT

One year ago, SAMHSA’s OBHE partnered with the White House Initiative on Asian Americans (AA), Native Hawaiians (NH), and Pacific Islanders (PI) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to host the first White House Summit for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Mental Health. This landmark event led to the formation of a public-private collaborative dedicated to addressing the increase in hate incidents targeting AA, NH, and PI communities. This webinar celebrates the upcoming launch of the Healing, Empowerment, Awareness, and Resilience Toolbox (HEART) with resources to counter hate. Presenters will discuss three approaches from the Toolbox, designed to uplift mental health and strengthen community:

• Racial Trauma Healing Circles
• Family-Friendly Media Videos on How to Talk About Hate
• Advocacy for Strengths-Based Prevention and Early Intervention Programming

These interventions and strategies can be adapted to support other diverse communities affected by hate.

The event will also be shared on Facebook Live at fb.com/nned.net and closed captioning will be available through Zoom.

Facilitator

Presenters

On the first day of her class, Annika Martin asks the assembled researchers at the University of Zurich in Switzerland to roll out their yoga mats and stand with their feet spread wide apart. They place their hands on their hips before swinging their torsos down towards the mat and back up again. The pose, called ‘wild goose drinking water’ is from Lu Jong, a foundational practice in Tantrayana Buddhism.

Martin, a health psychologist, can sense that some students are sceptical. They are academics at heart, many of whom have never tried yoga, and registered for Martin’s course to learn how to deal with the stress associated with academic research. Over the course of a semester, she teaches her students about stress and its impact on the body before giving them the tools to help cope with it — from yoga, meditation and progressive muscle relaxation to journalling.

It is one of many initiatives designed to combat the mental-health crisis that is gripping science and academia more broadly. The problems are particularly acute for students and early-career researchers, who are often paid meagre wages, have to uproot their lives every few years and have few long-term job prospects. But senior researchers face immense pressure as well. Many academics also experience harassment, discrimination, bullying and even sexual assault. The end result is that students and academics are much more likely to experience depression and anxiety than is the general population.

The University of Zurich now offers academics several popular courses on mental health. Beyond Martin’s class, called ‘Mindfulness and Meditation’, one helps students learn how to build resilience and another provides senior researchers with the tools they need to supervise PhD candidates.

The courses are in high demand. “We have way more registrations than we have actual course spots,” says Eric Alms, a programme manager who is responsible for many of the mental-health courses at the University of Zurich. “I’m happy that my courses are so successful. On the other hand, it’s a sign of troubling times when these are the most popular courses.”

Several studies over the past few years have collectively surveyed tens of thousands of researchers and have documented the scope and consequences of science’s mental-health crisis.

Read more at Nature.com.

Retired Command Sgt. Maj. Gretchen Evans served in the United States Army for 27 years until a rocket blast in Afghanistan brought her career to an abrupt end in 2006. At just 46 years old, Evans was left with near-total hearing loss, a traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder.

After more than a year of rehabilitation, she struggled to find a new identity.

“It was a devastating shock to me,” Evans said. “I lost my career, my passion and purpose. In the beginning, it was a very rough transition, not just from the military to civilian world, but overcoming these injuries. I struggled with employment. I struggled connecting with other people. I fell into a very lonely depressive state.”

Relief finally came in the form of a service dog named Aura, a black Labrador retriever with “lovable brown eyes” with whom Evans was paired in 2015. Evans retired her four-legged friend to a more domestic life in her home five years later, at which time she was paired with her second dog, a golden retriever and black lab mix she likes to call “Rambunctious Rusty.”

The benefits of service dogs for veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder are well documented in personal stories like Evans’ but there is a lack of empirical research on the use of the animals as a medical intervention. 

Researchers at the University of Arizona College of Veterinary Medicine have taken a step toward better understanding the relationship between veterans and service dogs, which they believe could lead to life-changing improvements in health care for veterans.

In a new study published in the medical journal JAMA Network Open, researchers found that veterans who worked with service dogs experienced significantly lower self-reported and clinician-rated PTSD symptom severity, lower anxiety and depression, a significantly higher quality of life and fewer feelings of isolation. Veterans working with service dogs also had 66% lower odds of receiving a PTSD diagnosis from a mental health professional after three months with a dog. 

While the results of the study support veterans partnering with service dogs to reduce PTSD symptoms, the researchers say more work must be done to better understand exactly how working with a service dog impacts other treatments for PTSD.

Read more at News.Arizona.edu.

A class where children learn to make chocolate while building a sense of community; a poetry workshop where migrants write and recite their stories of migration; and a wellness event where immigrant women youth explore different self-care stations like massage, affirmations and nail painting. These are some of the workshops implemented by local Brooklyn nonprofits Mixteca, RaisingHealth, and Brave House, which have introduced culturally tailored workshops to raise awareness about mental health within immigrant communities.

These organizations say that these workshops have helped combat the stigma surrounding mental health while addressing the lack of resources in communities where accessing mental health services is challenging. Data collected by these organizations show that demand for the programs has increased with the arrival of more than 200,000 migrants in NYC since the spring of 2022, further emphasizing the need for culturally sensitive services to raise awareness about mental health.

Lorena Kourousias, executive director of Mixteca, a nonprofit helping migrant communities in Sunset Park for decades, has seen firsthand the challenges that prevent migrants from accessing mental health services. At Mixteca, she said, many come asking for legal assistance, help enrolling in health insurance, IDNYC, and Fair Fares MetroCards while also requesting food, clothes, and diapers. The last thing on their mind is their mental health, she told Documented.

In 2023, Mixteca released a survey highlighting the need for mental health services in the immigrant community, which has been compounded by the population’s immediate needs for food, clothing and shelter. Mixteca’s mental health and wellness workshops have seen an increase in attendance in the past two years, Kourousias said, since the arrival of more than 200,000 asylum seekers to New York City. She said that Mixteca now has four full-time social workers, as opposed to one social worker part time in the past. 

Similarly, the Brave House, a nonprofit in Brooklyn supporting immigrant women and gender-expansive youth in NYC, has also had success in making mental health more approachable in the communities they serve.

Mabel Smith, director of development and operations at the Brave House, said that during a recent event, called “Wellness Wonderland,” their community members were given the opportunity to experience different self-care stations like massages, affirmations, and nail painting, among others — all of which are assisted by team members who are bilingual in English and Spanish. “It is important first and foremost that services are offered not only in a setting that is warm and friendly but also in a language that is accessible for members,” Smith said.

The World Health Organization has documented that refugees and migrants face different risks and needs for support when it comes to mental health, but there is still much to learn about this population. The WHO report “Mental Health of Refugees and Migrants: Risk and Protective Factors and Access to Care” states that the organization has limited data on how migration impacts the lives of other groups: older migrants, LGBTQI+, and internal labor migrants and affirms the need for more detailed, long-term research.

One of the challenges that migrants, particularly those with irregular status or who have recently arrived, face is the lack of health insurance. The average cost for a mental health session without health insurance ranges anywhere from $100 to $200 in the United States. “It’s much harder to receive mental health care without insurance or especially for lower-income people,” Grace Aaronson, capacity-building coordinator at Raising Health, said.

To combat the barriers to entering mental health services, Aaronson said that they have hosted no-cost workshops to spread the word about mental health while helping to destigmatize it. One example is a workshop that helps recently arrived migrants write and draw while practicing stress management techniques, like breathing exercises, working with plants, and other creative ways to release stress. “All while we are having conversations with the community throughout the workshop,” she said.

Read more at DocumentedNY.com.

In order to highlight pockets of excellence across the country, the NNED selects a partner organization to highlight once a month. Step Nation Inc. has been selected as the Partner of the Month for July in celebration of National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month.

Step Nation Inc. empowers communities through creative expression, addressing stress, and trauma. Their vision is a haven for families breaking free from systemic challenges and establish a foundation of well-being.

Some of the programs and services that are currently offered:

• Music as Medicine
• Therapeutic Arts
• Heritage Research
• Health and Wellness
• Cultural Events

Learn more about Step Nation Inc. and its mission to alleviate the impact of generational trauma by harnessing the power of art and culture.

View a list of previous NNED Partners of the Month.