The level of Americans' prejudice and discrimination toward people with serious mental illness or substance abuse problems didn't change over 10 years, a new study has found.
The findings raise questions about the effectiveness of campaigns to educate people about mental illness and suggest that new approaches may be needed, said the researchers at Indiana University and Columbia University.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has launched a new, interactive, online resource center to support children and adults living with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
The Repository of Recovery Resources is a one-stop source of information that can be used:
- to promote and create recovery-oriented mental health systems; and
- to increase awareness and understanding of the concept and reality of recovery.Originally designed to respond to the needs of state mental health administrators and consumers in their work at state offices of consumer/recipient affairs, these many resources are appropriate for anyone interested in recovery from serious mental illnesses.
Resources include:
- Articles
- Books
- Documents and Reports
- Multimedia and Websites
- Training and Technical Assistance
The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is providing a new dimension to its Hearts & Minds initiative, an educational program that promotes "mind and body" health practices for individuals who live with mental illness.A new "Mindfulness" section on NAMI's Hearts and Minds website includes a 10-minute video of guided mediation, along with information about other holistic methods to complement medication and therapy and help a person to gain greater control over the recovery process.
This research investigated whether the physical act of enclosing an emotionally laden stimulus can help alleviate the associated negative emotions. Four experiments found support for this claim. In the first two experiments, emotional negativity was reduced for participants who placed a written recollection of a regretted past decision or unsatisfied strong desire inside an envelope. A further experiment showed that enclosing a stimulus unrelated to the emotional experience did not have the same effect. Finally, we showed that the effect was not driven by participants simply doing something extra with the materials, and that the effect of physical enclosure was mediated by the psychological closure that participants felt toward the event.
"Pack all your troubles in your old kit bag and smile, smile, smile"
Researchers from Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, USA reveal that a significant number of patients with fibromyalgia responded well to Tai Chi, experiencing alleviation of joint pains and other symptoms. The study is published in NEJM (New England Journal of Medicine).
Go with the Flow (of chi).
The pharmaceutical industry is a "market for lemons," a market in which the seller knows much more than the buyer about the product and can profit from selling products less effective and less safe than consumers are led to believe, according to an analysis that will be presented at the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association."Sometimes drug companies hide or downplay information about serious side effects of new drugs and overstate the drugs' benefits," said Donald Light, the sociologist who authored the study and who is a professor of comparative health policy at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. "Then, they spend two to three times more on marketing than on research to persuade doctors to prescribe these new drugs. Doctors may get misleading information and then misinform patients about the risks of a new drug. It's really a two-tier market for lemons."
Too True
New research from the US suggests that trauma in childhood such as experiencing abuse or a serious stressful event like losing a parent is linked to a shorter lifespan and weaker immune system later in life, and that the immune impairment even adds to that caused by the stress of caring for a family member with dementia.
THURSDAY, Aug. 12 (HealthDay News) -- More cases of severe mental illness are being reported among college students than a decade ago, as more young people with mental health issues tackle a post-secondary education and are open to getting help when they need it, a new U.S. study shows.
The article as a whole is a little stupid. I suspect that rthe recovery movement and other community building efforts have something to do with this.
Foreign Policy/The Washington Post: The State Department is attempting to change how it handles mental health services for employees with high-stress jobs, "but there's still a great deal of stigma attached to seeking this kind of help," an internal report says. The State Department's Office of Inspector General is calling on the department to "remove the stigma by issuing a high-level statement encouraging returning diplomats to use the mental health tools at their disposal." Several programs and many mental health professionals wait for employees to take advantage of the programs. "There are also more social workers and psychiatrists than ever at the embassies in Baghdad and Kabul, but according to the OIG it's unclear whether there are enough. The report recommends the department survey the war zones to see if diplomats' mental needs are being adequately addressed" (Rogin, 8/5).
Stigma is everywhere in our culture-even when people should know better.