Monday, September 13, 2004

Assessing the Mental Health Status of Youth in Juvenile Justice Settings
Report from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, U.S. Department of Justice - "Reports the results of a study that used the Voice DISC, a computerized, self-administered version of the Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children (DISC), to screen for psychiatric disorders in youth newly admitted to juvenile assessment centers. The Voice DISC offers the following advantages for use in the juvenile justice system: minimal staff support requirements, immediate scoring that generates provisional diagnoses, and privacy that increases the likelihood of disclosure of sensitive personal information." The report is available in both HTML and Acrobat versions.  
  

Making Gains in Mental Health and Addictions: Knowledge, Integration, Action (Canada)
Web site of the second annual Making Gains confernce - "This year's conference, Making Gains in Mental Health and Addictions: Knowledge, Integration, Action, incorporates two key themes: how to communicate and use new knowledge whether in the delivery of services or building a better organization. Drawing on Toronto's diversity, the conference also focuses on the challenge of meeting the complex and diverse needs of all members of the community through creative and innovative strategies."  
  

For Honest Reports of Drug Trials
New York Times editorial - "A vast majority of patients and doctors would surely agree that pharmaceutical companies ought to reveal the results of clinical trials that suggest that their drugs don't work or may even be harmful. Yet all too often such results are either suppressed or are buried in obscure locations, and only glowing reports are widely disseminated. This week a coalition of leading medical journals announced a publication policy that should help rectify the problem but is hardly a full solution. The industry's trade group, meanwhile, offered a weak plan to quell the controversy without requiring much reform. In response to legal pressures and a growing credibility crisis, some drug companies have agreed to disclose at least some of their trials and findings in public databases. And the trade group, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, said it was creating a Web site where members could post summaries of trial results. The problem with such voluntary approaches is that decisions on what to report will be left to the companies, whose financial self-interest is what got us into this mess in the first place..." [Viewing New York Times resources requires registration, which is free].  
  

Child welfare system leaves kids in limbo (Kansas)
Wichita Eagle story - "Private agencies are facing stiff penalties for keeping children in system longer than needed Kansas child welfare officials, unhappy with rising costs and delays in finding permanent homes, are stepping up the pressure on private agencies that contract with the state. The nonprofit agencies will soon face financial penalties if children linger too long in state custody. Another key change will keep the same social worker assigned to a child who moves from family preservation programs to foster care to adoption. The move is aimed at heading off delays that disrupt children's lives. Eight years and hundreds of millions of dollars after Kansas became the first -- and still only --state to turn all major child welfare services over to private agencies, the results are mixed..."  
  

The real shame of mental illness
Editorial in The Oregonian - "It used to be the stigma that kept people from seeking treatment for mental illness. Now it's the lack of insurance and high cost of care. Today if anyone is still feeling any embarrassment associated with mental illness, it should be the members of Congress who are secretly blocking a bill that would require insurers to cover the mind just as they do the body."  
  

Treatment gets its day in court (Montana)
Great Falls Tribune story - "Great Falls is a community in pain, economically and emotionally scarred by drug abuse, gambling and alcoholism, addictions that span generations and destroy families. For the last year, a core group of people has been working on a plan to help break the cycle. It's being touted as an unusually bright light on an otherwise bleak landscape. Come January, Cascade County will initiate Treatment Court, a voluntary program for nonviolent, adult offenders whose underlying problem is an addiction to drugs, alcohol or gambling. The largely federally funded program will emphasize treatment over punishment, employ intensive, frequent, personal methods of supervision and tailor assistance to meet the specific needs of the individual being treated..."  
  

A Declaration Of Refusal To Comply With Any New Freedom Commission Mandate For Universal Mental Health Screening Of Children In The Schools
Press release from John Breeding and Wildest Colts Resources, which describes itself as a "resource site for parents, and a challenge to the biomedical mental health industry." The release begins, "Our declaration of refusal is a vigorous response to and rejection of the recommendations of the President's New Freedom Commission on mental health policy in the United States, a health policy that would mandate virtually universal mental health screening, including the 52 million children and 6 million adults in the public schools. We prefer to call it the 'New Intrusion Commission.' Its recommendations are a direct assault on child and family privacy, and a real threat to our children's well-being. Already, about 9 million school age children are on very dangerous psychotropic drugs, all for alleged 'mental illnesses' like so-called ADHD, none of which have been validated as real diseases by scientific medicine. The New Freedom Commission wants to even more vigorously pursue the labeling and drugging of our children, by screening ALL children and adults in the public schools (and elsewhere) for signs of possible 'mental illness.' This really means they are actively pursuing an expansion of the child market for psychiatric pharmaceuticals." See also the Declaration of Refusal at the Wildest Colts Resources web site.  
  

Problems soaring among teenagers (UK)
Evening Standard story - "Teenagers are now far more likely to suffer behavioural problems and depression than 25 years ago, a disturbing new report has found. The mental health of young people has declined sharply and the rate of emotional problems such as anxiety and depression has increased by 70 per cent among adolescents. According to the biggest study of its kind conducted in Britain, the chances that 15-year-olds will have behavioural problems such as lying, stealing and being disobedient have more than doubled. The study, Time Trends in Adolescent Mental Health, found boys are more likely to suffer behavioural problems and girls more likely to experience emotional problems. However, the study, to be published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry in November, found no increase in fighting, bullying or other aggressive behaviour..."  
  

New Warnings Sought on Antidepressants
New York Times story reprinted at the Star News Online (North Carolina) = "When the Food and Drug Administration opens an advisory committee hearing tomorrow into the safety of antidepressants, several committee members will push for tougher warnings saying that a child or teenager given the drugs can become suicidal in the first weeks of therapy, they said in interviews."  
  

Mental health care needs expressed to legislators (Texas)
Big Spring Herald story - "Unprecedented changes in the delivery of mental health and retardation services were forced upon social service agencies by cuts incurred during the past legislative session lawmakers were told Thursday. Shelley Smith, LMSW, West Texas Centers for MHMR CEO, said providers have continued to deliver the same quality of services by the thinnest of margins, but cannot incur any more funding reductions. Mental health and mental retardation advocates and providers presented their wish list for the next legislative session to lawmakers..."  
  

A time for treatment (UK)
Editorial in the Guardian on the recently proposed new mental health legislation (see last Thursday's posting here), asking "...why this week was there so much opposition from the lobby to the newly redrafted bill? Simple. The main driver behind the bill is not the needs of the mentally ill but a desire to appease a media-misinspired public concern with the risks that mental patients pose. Statistically you are 20 times more likely to be killed by a sane person than an insane one. By far the biggest threat posed by mentally ill patients is to themselves, with more than 1,000 committing suicide every year." See also Clear as Mud (also in the Guardian) and Mental health tsar attacks draft Bill's 'hysterical' critics and (the Independent).