Thursday, September 11, 2003

Calculating the Toll of Trauma
New York Times story - "New trauma reawakens old trauma, or so mental health professionals have often asserted. And in the aftermath of Sept. 11, many experts predicted that the terrorist attacks would exacerbate or rekindle psychiatric problems in people with a history of post-traumatic stress disorder or other mental illnesses, and increase the demand for psychiatric treatment. But a new study has found that the use of mental health services at medical centers run by the federal Department of Veterans Affairs in New York and Washington, the cities most directly affected, did not rise after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon." [Viewing New York Times resources requires registration, which is free]. Marking the second anniversary of the September 11 attacks, other related articles of note on trauma, PTSD and mental health issues include:

• Asian-Americans Face Cultural Barrier to Counseling, New York Times [requires registration, which is free] - "According to a study being released today by the Asian American Federation of New York, the Hamdanis were among many Asian-Americans who rejected professional therapy after Sept. 11. Even some counseling services developed for Asians were not used much more in the year after Sept. 11, the study found."
  
• NMHA Offers Tips for Coping With the Anniversary of Sept. 11. See also the NMHA press release, America’s Mental Health Still Ignored in Terrorism Response.
  
• Researchers: 9-11 to linger in lives, Ann Arbor News - "Even though two years have elapsed since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, 76 percent of Americans feel no safer from terrorism than they did immediately after jets crashed in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. The recent poll result doesn't surprise Reg Williams, a University of Michigan Medical School Psychiatry Department professor who agrees with other researchers that Americans will never get over the trauma of the attacks."
  
• Study: 9/11 Stress Declined Fast, Newsday - "The number of New Yorkers suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder declined dramatically in the six months after the Sept. 11 attack, but researchers predict other mental health issues could persist, according to a study released Wednesday. The study by epidemiologists at the New York Academy of Medicine in Manhattan found that the percentage of Manhattan residents with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder dropped from 7.5 percent one month after Sept. 11 to 0.6 percent after six months."
  
• Is Trauma Being Trivialized?, New York Times [requires registration, which is free] - "...as mental health experts continue to fine-tune our understanding of how the body responds to catastrophic events, some skeptics have been questioning whether terms like 'trauma' and 'post-traumatic stress disorder' (known as PTSD) are being misused by victims, lawyers and health professionals."

  
  

57,000 Texas Children at Risk of Losing Mental Health Benefits
September 4 National Mental Health Association press release - "Despite the needs of 57,000 children who receive mental health coverage through Texas’ State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), the state is proposing to virtually eliminate mental health benefits under the program. The National Mental Health Association urges U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson to reject this alarming proposal and, in turn, discourage other states from following suit and targeting vulnerable populations in attempts to cut costs..."  
  

Senators To Offer Amendment to Increase Medical Research Funding – Increased Funds for Mental Illness Research At Stake
A call to action at the NAMI web site - "The U.S. Senate will soon begin considering legislation covering FY 2004 funding for federal agencies and programs that include important federal investments for mental illness research. This bill, known as Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations bill (S 1356) includes the proposed 2004 budgets for both the National Institute of Health and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Because of tight budget constraints and a growing federal budget deficit, neither the House nor the Senate version of the Labor-HHS Appropriations bill includes sufficient increases for needed investments in research and services on severe mental illness..."