Publications on Mental Health Topics

The pandemic worsened young people’s mental health crisis., by Matt Richtel, The New York Times, Dec 7 2021.

“The United States surgeon general on Tuesday warned that young people are facing “devastating” mental health effects as a result of the challenges experienced by their generation, including the coronavirus pandemic.  The report cited significant increases in self-reports of depression, anxiety and emergency-room visits for mental health challenges. In the United States, emergency room visits for suicide attempts rose 51 percent for adolescent girls in early 2021 as compared with the same period in 2019. The figure rose 4 percent for boys.  Globally, symptoms of anxiety and depression doubled during the pandemic, the report noted. But mental health issues were already on the rise in the United States, with emergency room visits related to depression, anxiety and related issues up 28 percent between 2011 and 2015. ”

The pandemic worsened young people’s mental health crisis., by Matt Richtel, The New York Times, Dec 7 2021.

“The United States surgeon general on Tuesday warned that young people are facing “devastating” mental health effects as a result of the challenges experienced by their generation, including the coronavirus pandemic.  The report cited significant increases in self-reports of depression, anxiety and emergency-room visits for mental health challenges. In the United States, emergency room visits for suicide attempts rose 51 percent for adolescent girls in early 2021 as compared with the same period in 2019. The figure rose 4 percent for boys.  Globally, symptoms of anxiety and depression doubled during the pandemic, the report noted. But mental health issues were already on the rise in the United States, with emergency room visits related to depression, anxiety and related issues up 28 percent between 2011 and 2015. ”

Why people with mental illness are at higher risk of COVID, by RHITU CHATTERJEE , NPR, Nov 22 2021.

“Even before the federal government's recent decision last week to authorize COVID-19 boosters all adults, it had already recommended them in October for people with certain high-risk conditions. Along with with illnesses like diabetes and heart disease, that list included mental health conditions. ”

How to protect your mental health during the stressful holiday season, by Esmy Jimenez, Seattle Times, Nov 22 2021.

“Tis the season. Soon — or already in some cases — lights will go up, trees will be decorated (for those who celebrate), and families will come together to eat their Thanksgiving favorites. Many people are preparing to come together with loved ones for the holidays, after months of pandemic-forced distance. But with those holidays comes a slew of stress and complications: navigating complex family dynamics, intrusive questions from well-meaning aunties, and worries about money or how to make the most of the time away from work.  ”

So you've watched 'Dopesick'. Here's what you can do to help ease the opioid crisis, by BRIAN MANN, NPR, Nov 19 2021.

“Like many things, the pandemic has acutely impacted the opioid crisis over the past two years. COVID-19 has disrupted every aspect of daily life, and left many struggling to find treatment and support. According to SAMHSA's 2020 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, not only did the coronavirus outbreak adversely impact many Americans' mental health, but it worsened their preexisting alcohol and drug abuse issues.   ”

Children and teens face unequal mental health realities, by Marisa Fernandez, Yahoo News, Oct 12 2021.

“n the weeks after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, at least 55% of children felt more "sad, depressed, or unhappy," compared to 25% of adults, according to a new report out Monday from the Child Mind Institute. Why it matters: The data offers a glimpse at the differences in children's early psych0logical responses as researchers work to tease out the pandemic's potential long-term effects on the incoming generation's mental health and developmental skills. ”

Facebook will try to 'nudge' teens away from harmful content, by Susan Cornwell, Reuters, Oct 11 2021.

“WASHINGTON, Oct 10 (Reuters) - A Facebook Inc (FB.O) executive said Sunday that the company would introduce new measures on its apps to prompt teens away from harmful content, as U.S lawmakers scrutinize how Facebook and subsidiaries like Instagram affect young people's mental health. Nick Clegg, Facebook's vice president of global affairs, also expressed openness to the idea of letting regulators have access to Facebook algorithms that are used to amplify content. But Clegg said he could not answer the question whether its algorithms amplified the voices of people who had attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. ”

Anxiety, depression fluctuated with COVID-19 waves: Study, by Kiara Alfonseca, ABC News, Oct 10 2021.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has had a major impact on the mental health of the nation, according to a new study published in the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's weekly journal, MMWR. The CDC said that social isolation, coronavirus-related deaths and stress weighed heavy on Americans, forcing many to confront new mental health challenges. ”

Why It’s So Hard to Find a Therapist Who Takes Insurance, by Andrea Petersen, The Wall Street Journal, Oct 5 2021.

“Finding a therapist who takes insurance was tough before the pandemic. Now, therapists and patients say, an increase in the need for mental-health care is making the search even harder. Especially in big cities such as Los Angeles, New York and Washington, D.C., demand for mental-health care is so strong that many experienced therapists don’t accept any insurance plans, they say. They can easily fill their practices with patients who would pay out of pocket, they add. Therapists who do take insurance are often booked up. And in many smaller towns and rural areas, there are few mental-health professionals at all. Finding a provider who takes insurance, or lowering your rates in other ways, is possible but often takes legwork that can be draining when you are already grappling with mental-health issues. About 34% of people with private insurance said they had difficulty finding a therapist who would accept their coverage, according to a 2016 survey—the most recent data available—of more than 3,100 participants conducted by the National Alliance on Mental Illness, a national mental-health advocacy group. By comparison, 9% said they had difficulty finding an in-network primary-care provider.  Office visits to mental-health providers are more than five times more likely to be out of network than are visits to primary-care providers, according to a 2019 report from Milliman, a consulting firm, which analyzed insurance-claims data. In 2017, 17.2% of mental-health office visits were out of network, compared with 3.2% of primary-care visits, the Milliman report found. ”

Suicide rate among active duty service members increased by 41% between 2015 and 2020, by Alex Marquardt and Ellie Kaufman, CNN, Sep 30 2021.

“The suicide rate among active duty service members in the US military increased by 41.4% in the five years from 2015 to 2020, according to data provided in the annual report from the Department of Defense on suicide in the military.  The suicide rate among active duty service members increased by 9.1% in 2020, according to data from the report, which was released Thursday. From 2018 to 2020, it rose 15.3%.  The suicide rate among reserve members of the US military went up by 19.2% in 2020, but the rate has overall gone down since 2018, the report shows. The suicide rate among National Guard members increased by 31.7% in 2020, but has also gone down overall since 2018.  Some 580 members of the military, among active duty, reserves and National Guard, died by suicide in 2020. The report also shows 202 military family members died by suicide in 2019. ”

Find your sleep 'sweet spot' to protect your brain as you age, study suggests, by Kristen Rogers, CNN, Sep 26 2021.

“How long older adults sleep could affect their brain health, according to a study published Monday in the journal JAMA Neurology.  Disrupted sleep is common in late life, the study authors wrote, and associated with changes in cognitive function -- the mental capacity for learning, thinking, reasoning, problem-solving, decision-making, remembering and paying attention.  Age-related changes in sleep have also been linked with early signs of Alzheimer's disease, depression and cardiovascular disease, so the authors investigated possible associations between self-reported sleep duration, demographic and lifestyle factors, subjective and objective cognitive function, and participants' levels of beta amyloid.  Those in the study who reported short sleep duration -- defined in the study as six hours or less -- had elevated levels of beta amyloid, which "greatly increases" risk for dementia, said the study's lead author Joe Winer, a postdoctoral research fellow at Stanford University in California, via email. ”

How to Detect Your Child’s Emotional Distress Before the School’s AI Does, by Julie Jargon, The Wall Street Journal, Sep 18 2021.

“School districts use artificial-intelligence software that can scan student communications and web searches on school-issued devices—and even devices that are logged in via school networks—for signs of suicidal ideation, violence against fellow students, bullying and more. Included in the scans are emails and chats between friends, as well as student musings composed in Google Docs or Microsoft Word. Many school districts have used monitoring software over the past three years to prevent school shootings, but it has evolved to become a tool to spot a range of mental-health issues, including anxiety, depression and eating disorders. School administrators say such surveillance is more important than ever as students return to the classroom after 18 months of pandemic-related stress, uncertainty and loss. Critics say it raises questions about privacy, misuse and students’ ability to express feelings freely or search for answers. ”

College students reported record-high marijuana use and record-low drinking in 2020, study says, by Maria Luisa Paul, The Washington Post, Sep 13 2021.

“A newly released study found that nearly half of the country’s college-age students said they consumed marijuana last year, leading researchers to wonder whether the pandemic may have spurred the record in cannabis consumption. One says the trend underpins the changing practices during — and struggles to adapt to — the global health crisis.  “The pandemic seems to have actually made marijuana into an alternative to escape the monotony of isolation,” said Nora Volkow, director of the federal government’s National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). “It’s made life become more boring, more stressful. So if drugs let you experience that completely different mental state, I wonder whether that would be a factor that leads people to use them.” ”

Good Anxiety Does Exist. Here's How You Can Benefit From It, by Meghan Keane and Claire Marie Schneider, NPR, Sep 9 2021.

“Anxiety can feel like the enemy. However it shows up — a tightness in the chest, a knot in the stomach — it's easy to want to obliterate those feelings.  But according to Wendy Suzuki, that might not be the best approach.  "Anxiety evolved to help protect us," says Suzuki, a professor of neural science and psychology at the Center for Neural Science at New York University. "We need to recalibrate our level of anxiety to get it back to that level where it is superprotective for us."  Suzuki wants us to make friends with our anxiety and reap all the gifts it can offer.  In her new book, Good Anxiety: Harnessing the Power of the Most Misunderstood Emotion, Suzuki outlines strategies to turn that sinking feeling into something productive. Anxiety, she says, is trying to give us information about what we appreciate and what we value in our lives. ”

Black Kids In California More Likely To Be Hospitalized For Police-Related Injuries, by Deepa Shivaram, NPR, Sep 9 2021.

“A new study out of California shows that Black boys and girls are hospitalized from police violence at a rate far higher than their white peers.  The researchers from the University of California, Berkeley looked into injuries of children and teens caused by law enforcement between 2005-2017. They used data from emergency department visits and inpatients hospitalizations in the state of California.  Black boys ages 15-19 had the highest rate of hospitalization due to police violence, but the widest racial gap existed in the 10-14 age group. Black boys and girls ages 10-14 are injured at 5.3 and 6.7 times, respectively, the rate for white boys and girls, the study says.  "These findings suggest that the protections of childhood are not afforded to all children and contribute to evidence on policing as a pathway through which structural racism operates in young people's lives," said Kriszta Farkas, one of the researchers. ”