Mentally Healthy Nation

We wanted to do something different to start the new year. Instead of a typical episode, we're encouraging you to use this time to take care of yourself and recharge. We will be back next month with another great guest. See you then! 

On this special episode, our Executive Producer, Joy Lloyd-Montgomery, MPH, joins our host, Christopher Chun-Seeley, MSW, to reflect on our first year of the podcast. Joy and Chris revisit topics from some of their favorite episodes, brainstorm ideas for future episodes, and discuss building a Mentally Healthy Nation.

If you have ideas or questions about the podcast or the APA Foundation's work, please reach out to us at [email protected]

To get involved in our justice initiatives, email [email protected] 

For more information about our school-based work, email [email protected] 

November is Native American Heritage Month. Today, two psychiatrists who have worked with Indigenous peoples join us to talk about the struggles and protective factors associated with Indigenous mental health and how mental health professionals and others can become better advocates for Indigenous/Native American communities. 

Resources for this episode: 

• SAMHSA American Indian and Alaska Native Culture Card: A Guide to Build Cultural Awareness
• Toolkit for Suicide Prevention and Mental Health Promotion in Tribal Communities
• Groundswell: Indigenous Knowledge and a Call to Action for Climate Change
• Envision: The Big Picture
• One Sky Center, The American Indian/Alaska Native National Resource Center for Health, Education and Research
• We R Native website and We R Native Instagram
• Healthy Native Youth
• Center for Native American Youth

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/indigenous-native-american-mental-health 

Mary Hasbah Roessel, MD is a Navajo (Diné) psychiatrist from Round Rock, Arizona on the Navajo nation. She is a distinguished life fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and current APA Area 7 Trustee and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico at the Santa Fe Indian Health Center. She received her medical degree at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and returned to the southwest to complete her residency in psychiatry at the University of New Mexico. She received an APA/ NIMH Fellowship during her residency and has since worked for 30 years with Indigenous peoples of the southwest, Alaska, and British Columbia. She has special expertise in cultural psychiatry. She grew up on the Navajo reservation with her family and extended Navajo family. Her grandfather Ashihii, was a revered Navajo medicine man. She was the lead facilitator to the Indigenous Cultural competency course working with the American Psychiatric Association’s Division of Diversity and Health Equity. She is a member of the Climate Psychiatry Alliance and APA Caucus on Climate Change and Mental Health. She presented on a panel discussing Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in March 2016. She has provided presentations on Indigenous knowledge and climate change and wrote a chapter in the book:Groundswell- Indigenous knowledge and a call to action for climate change, edited by her husband, Joe Neidhardt, M.D., and daughter/artist, Nicole Neidhardt. Her chapter is on Essential Elements of Change, focused on living within two worlds—Indigenous and Western cultures in this climate crisis. She presented at COP26 in Glasgow, in November 2021 with her husband and daughter. The title of their presentation was: Walk In Beauty: Future Dreaming Through Indigenous Knowledges and Western Science. She enjoys spending time with her family hiking and participating in Navajo ceremonies in New Mexico and Arizona.

Monica Taylor-Desir, MD, MPH is a Consultant with the Department of Psychiatry and Psychology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, where she serves as a community psychiatrist for the Olmsted County Assertive Community Treatment Team and as the co-chair for the Diversity and Inclusion Committee for the Mayo Midwest Department of Psychiatry and Psychology. Prior to joining Mayo Clinic, Dr. Taylor-Desir served as a community psychiatrist for tribal communities for 16 years. Dr. Taylor-Desir graduated from the University Of Cincinnati College Of Medicine. After completing her psychiatry residency and a fellowship in community psychiatry at Emory University, Dr. Taylor-Desir began her career with the Winslow Indian Health Care Center in Winslow, AZ working with a predominantly Navajo population. This work was through her commitment to the National Health Service Corps as a Scholarship recipient. Dr. Taylor-Desir then moved to Phoenix, Arizona to serve the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community for eight years. She was the first tribally hired psychiatrist and provided outpatient psychiatric care to community members, worked with the crisis team, the Salt River Department of Corrections and the community residential treatment center. She also worked to secure psychiatric care between state and tribal jurisdictions. Dr. Taylor-Desir then moved to New Town, North Dakota to serve the Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara Nation for three years as their Chief Medical Officer and psychiatrist for the Elbowoods Memorial Health Care Center. She was instrumental in securing SAMHSA grants addressing mental health and substance use in tribal communities. One of her proudest honors is receiving the American Psychiatric Association 2019 Award for Excellence in Service and Advocacy from the Women of the Assembly. Dr. Taylor-Desir also serves as a member of the National Advisory Committee to the National Health Service Corps, where she continues advocacy for and service to tribal and rural communities.

Today, Dr. Marc Fishman helps us better understand Substance Use Disorders (SUDs), the impact of Opioid Use Disorder (OUD) and other SUDs on the country and the public health landscape, and the steps being taken to treat patients, enhance the quality of care delivered, and improve lives. Dr. Fishman, an addiction Psychiatrist, is the Medical Director of Maryland Treatment Centers and an Associate Professor at the Johns Hopkins Department of Psychiatry.

*This episode is brought to you in collaboration with the Addiction Medicine Practice-based Research and Quality Improvement Network (AMNet). 

Resources for this episode:

• Addiction and Substance Use Disorders - American Psychiatric Association
• Substance Use and Co-Occurring Mental Disorders - National Institute of Mental Health
• Addiction and Substance Misuse Reports and Publications - U.S. Department of Health and Human Services  
• Drug Overdose Deaths in the U.S. - Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/opioid-and-other-substance-use-disorders 

We've talked about youth mental health, but it's time for us to hear from the youth themselves. On this episode, high school students and hosts of the On Our Minds podcast, Matt Suescun and Faiza Ashar share some of the major mental health challenges youth face, their experience hosting a podcast about teen mental health, and ideas for how we can improve youth mental health programs. The first step: include them. 

Resources for this episode: 

• On Our Minds podcast: https://studentreportinglabs.org/on-our-minds/ 
• Free resources for schools and families: https://apafdn.org/Impact/Schools/Notice-Talk-Act-at-School/Free-Resources 
• Check out the rest of our podcast family at https://psychiatry.org/podcasts 

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/what-you-should-know-about-the-988-suicide-crisis 

988 (previously 1-800-273-TALK) is the new, easier-to-remember national suicide & crisis hotline that provides 24/7 confidential support via call, text, and chat to people experiencing a mental or behavioral health crisis. The hotline officially launched on July 16, 2022, but were states prepared for the rollout? Is 988 really the mental health version of 911? Today, two psychiatrists, Dr. John Palmieri and Dr. Eric Rafla-Yuan, join us to answer these questions and talk about the future of 988.

John Palmieri, MD, MHA, is a Senior Medical Advisor at SAMHSA and currently serving as the Acting Director for the 988 and Behavioral Health Crisis Coordinating Office. Prior to his arrival at SAMHSA, Dr. Palmieri was the Division Chief for Behavioral Healthcare at the Arlington County, Virginia, Department of Human Services. Dr. Palmieri is a licensed physician in the Commonwealth of Virginia and is Board Certified in Adult Psychiatry. He graduated from Brown University Medical School and completed his Adult Psychiatry Residency at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Eric Rafla-Yuan, MD is the 2021 American Psychiatric Association (APA) Jeanne Spurlock Congressional Fellow, and a voluntary assistant clinical professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California San Diego, where he founded and led the psychiatry residency diversity committee. He graduated medical school and completed additional training in bioethics at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, and completed residency training at the UC San Diego Community Psychiatry Program. He currently serves on the APA Council of Advocacy and Government Relations, and previously served as the legislative director for the San Diego Psychiatric Society, and as a board trustee for the California State Association of Psychiatrists. His research focuses on policy and structural drivers of health outcomes and his work on clinical crisis services has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine and Health Affairs. 

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/what-you-should-know-about-the-988-suicide-crisis 

Resources

• 988 Frequently Asked Questions | SAMHSA
• 988 Implementation Act Packet (house.gov)
• Eric Rafla-Yuan (@DrEricRaflaYuan) / Twitter
• Check out the rest of our podcast family at psychiatry.org/podcasts 

July is National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month, named after the great author, journalist, teacher, and mental health advocate, Bebe Moore Campbell. One of the goals of this month is to bring additional awareness to the inequities in our mental health systems. These systems have faced appropriate scrutiny from minoritized communities due to limited access to mental health care, a lack of cultural representation among mental health providers, and issues of inequitable treatment. Today, we're joined by Dr. Napoleon Higgins, Executive Director of the Black Psychiatrists of America, to discuss what's being done to address mental health equity and how we can get involved.

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/advancing-mental-health-equity 

The words we use have power and can, even unintentionally, contribute to the stigma associated with mental illness. To address this, the Well Beings Campaign developed the Mental Health Language Guide to equip adults, regardless of their experience, with person-first language tools for discussing mental health concerns with youth. 

On this episode, Alita McCalmon, project lead for the Mental Health Language Guide and Senior Manager of National Education for WETA Television, talks to us about the guide and shares how our language can help create safe spaces for youth, our LGBTQIA community members, folks with disabilities, people with mental health conditions, and more. 

Resources for this episode: 

• Well Beings Mental Health Language Guide
• Hiding in Plain Sight: Youth Mental Illness trailer
• Our Turn to Talk 

Check out the rest of our podcast family at https://psychiatry.org/podcasts 

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/language-matters 

While college is often reflected on as a great time in people's lives, that experience was never without stress and anxiety. However, over the past two years, issues that college students normally face have been exacerbated by the uncertainty and grief associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, societal reckonings, and racial and political tensions. So, how are college students doing these days? 

Joining us today are two psychiatrists working on college campuses, Dr. Ludmila De Faria and Dr. Meera Menon. They give us insight into college mental health, how the pandemic and other issues have impacted students' experiences and access to services, and provide tips for families and loved ones to better support their students' mental health.

Ludmila De Faria, MD is an Associate Professor at the University of Florida where she also sees patients. Dr. De Faria has been a psychiatrist in Florida for over 15 years and is especially interested in increasing access and decreasing mental health disparities among minorities and providing a culturally sensitive environment for patients. She is a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and an active member of the APA's Council on Children, Adolescents, and Their Families. Dr. De Faria was born in Brazil where she earned her medical degree from the Universidade de Brasilia and moved to the United States in 1991 to complete medical training at Jackson Memorial Hospital/University of Miami.

Meera Menon, MD is a psychiatrist at Ohio State University’s Counseling and Consultation Service. At Ohio State, Dr. Menon is involved in the Eating Concerns Consultation Team, the Transgender Advocacy Team, and the Training Committee. In addition to also being an active member of the APA's Council on Children, Adolescents, and Their Families, she serves as Chair of the APA Caucus on College Mental Health and Secretary of the Association for College Psychiatry. Dr. Menon earned her medical degree from Wright State University where she also completed her psychiatry residency. 

Resources for this episode:

• College Psychiatry: Strategies to Improve Access to Mental Health, featuring Dr. De Faria and edited by Dr. Menon and Michelle Riba MD. 
• Guides to support policy decisions on college mental health
• The Campus Cure: A Parent's Guide to Mental Health and Wellness for College Students
• The Stressed Years of Their Lives: Helping Your Kid Survive and Thrive During Their College Years
• APA Foundation resources for parents and Notice. Talk. Act. at School

Check out the rest of our podcast family at psychiatry.org/podcasts 

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/how-are-college-students-doing 

Employee assistance programs (EAPs) are an underutilized option for people to connect with needed services and support. Today, Julie Fabsik-Swarts, CEO of the Employee Assistance Professionals Association or EAPA, joins us to dispel myths about EAPs and discuss how EAPA is making a positive difference in supporting EAPs and people through difficult times in their lives. 

Resources from the Center for Workplace Mental Health (workplacementalhealth.org): 

• Beating Burnout 
• Workplace Stress
• Workplace Resilience

For a transcript of this episode, visit: https://apafdn.org/news-events/mentally-healthy-nation-podcast/employee-assistance-programs-make-a-difference 

Check out the rest of our podcast family at psychiatry.org/podcasts