Tuesday, March 25, 2003

Close to Home: A Report on Behavioral Health Services for Children in Connecticut’s Juvenile Justice System
A report published last month by the Child Health and Development Institute of Connecticut and available as a series of Adobe Acrobat files - "The report is the culmination of a year-long study of behavioral health resources available to children in Connecticut's juvenile justice system and offers an analysis of current services, contrasts them with successful national effective practices and makes recommendations for system enhancements."  
  

Use of Alternative Health Care Practices by Persons With Serious Mental Illness: Perceived Benefits
A study in the American Journal of Public Health that was supported by a grant jointly funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research and the Center for Mental Health Services of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.  
  

Jail time for psychiatric assessment (Canada)
Brief item in the latest issue of the CMHA/Ontario Division newsletter, Mental Health Notes - "Mentally ill people waiting for court-ordered psychiatric assessments are routinely spending a month or more in jail, according to Ottawa defence lawyer Will Murray."  
  

Red Ink Blues
This link goes to the first article of a five-part series in the "Taxes/Budget" section of Stateline.org, "Govs Scramble For Soundbites To Decry Budget Crisis." See also part two, Human Impact of States’ Budget Cuts.  
  

Treatment for Minor Depression
NIMH press release - "In a new approach to research on minor depression, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has launched a four-year study to determine the safety and effectiveness of St. John's wort, a common herbal supplement, and citalopram, a standard antidepressant, compared to placebo."  
  

Fewer Referrals to Specialists for Depression
Health News Digest story reprinted at PsycPORT - "The treatment strategy of major depressive disorder (MDD) is changing. As physicians gain more experience with antidepressants, referrals to specialists, principally to psychiatrists, are decreasing. In addition, the use of combination therapy is increasing and this is due to increased experience and confidence with antidepressants and the plethora of clinical trials showing the efficacy of non-antidepressant drugs."  
  

Heroin's New Generation: Young, White and Middle Class
New York Times article - "At New York's state-licensed centers, the rate of admission for heroin addiction has caught up with that of cocaine and crack in the last five years, according to a report released in November by the National Drug Intelligence Center. Over all, 32,000 people of all ages were admitted to state treatment centers last year for heroin addiction, up from 29,000 in 1997." [Viewing New York Times resources requires registration, which is free].  
  

Mental health facility faces uncertainty in face of cuts (Alabama)
Tuscaloosa News story - "Since its creation in 1973, Indian Rivers Community Mental Health Center has practically traded places with once-dominant Bryce Hospital, providing mental illness and retardation services to 5,535 consumers throughout Bibb, Pickens and Tuscaloosa counties. Indian Rivers operates 30 different residential facilities in Tuscaloosa alone. But a lean economy and an even leaner state budget is forcing the center, much like state-run mental illness institutions facing consolidation and possible closure, to examine the way it does business."