Best in Mental Health (January 2019)

Mental Health Roundup 12/24/19 – 1/27/19

This roundup contains some of the latest news in social work, healthcare, private practice and more! Latest guidelines on how to work with men and boys, help prevent suicide, employ the social justice compass, create a social media policy, handle people saying your price is wrong and much more!

This wrap-up’s main themes are:

• Therapy and Relationships
• Healthcare
• Advocacy
• Self-Care/Inspiration
• Social Work, Technology & Education
• NonProfit Career & Private Practice

Therapy and Relationships

• 4 Ways To Offer A Sincere Apology – Julie Hanks – “the way we respond to our own actions and words can either strengthen or detract from the relationship… Get Specific About Your Behavior…”
• APA’s Guidelines for Working with Men & Boys – John M. Grohol/PsychCentral – “encourage positive father involvement and healthy family relationships… understand the impact of power, privilege, and sexism on the development of boys and men and on their relationships with others…”
• Carrots, sticks … and other ways to motivate – All in the Mind w/Cassie White & Richard Ryan- “The biggest thing for most people is finding a really tangible, meaningful reward… sustain and cultivate the motivation that comes from within people…”
• To change old habits, you have to know WHY you do what you do – Michelle May – “thinking about things a certain way puts us into a loop called TFAR… when you’re able to identify the underlying thoughts, you can shift them to new thoughts that put you in a more effective loop…”
• Feeling Stuck or Anxious? Change Your Story to Move Forward – Melanie Greenberg – “adopting the “fly on the wall” approach… psychological distance… from being caught up in your negative thoughts and feelings about the event…”
• How to Talk to Kids About Drugs and Alcohol – Dr. Robyn Silverman w/with Jeremy G. Schneider – “create a safe environment where our children feel safe asking us questions and divulging information… Top tips and scripts to talk to kids…”
• The Impact Of Bullying – Therapy Chat w/Danielle Matthew – “empathy first… ask the kids… how are you feeling? I’m wondering if you’re feeling anxious/scared… plan of action… what do you want to do about it?… we become a helpful guide to our children…”
• Nowhere to rest my head – Teenage Whisperer – “Know that for many of us ‘home’ is not what it is for you… Remember that if I am drinking or using drugs I am probably looking for the rest that my life does not provide… Provide me with some hint of a spiritual home…”
• To Prevent Misunderstandings, Question Intent – Hilary Jacobs Hendel – “When emotions and the resulting anxiety drive interactions, it’s easy for minor misunderstandings to escalate into full-fledged fights simply because of biology…”
• SSW Group Activities We Love – Marjorie Metcalf – “Student(s) will learn how to belly breathe when presented with a situation that causes frustration or anger… Should I? Or Shouldn’t I?… great team building activity to do with teens…”
• Suicide—and a Reflection on Our Changing American Society – SAMHSA – “suicide… remains… the 10th leading cause of death for adults and the second-leading cause of death in our youth… majority (83%) of individuals who die by suicide have accessed health services in the year prior to death…”
• Teaching Kids About Money: Preparing Teens for Financial Independence – Wendy Wisner/Your Teen Mag – “Financial independence and stability are an important part of being an adult… It’s about building self-esteem and confidence around these issues…”

Healthcare

• Countering misinformation about flu vaccine: Why it’s so hard – Matthew Motta, Dominik Stecula, & Kathryn Haglin – “focus should be on presenting people with the myth correcting information prior to the misinformation…”
• Standards and principles for evaluating mental health apps – Victoria Betton/Mental Elf – “end user must have the option to “opt out” of sharing their information… Clinical trials to determine the efficacy and effectiveness…”
• How the Use of Apps Helps People with Mental Illness– InSocialWork podcast w/Christopher Larrison – “how smartphones can be used as a conduit to reduce clients’ isolation and increase their access to useful information about themselves and their condition…”
• Suicide Prevention Is Every Social Worker’s Business – Kate Jackson/Social Work Today – “suicide rate rose 24% from 1999 to 2014… anyone can help save a life from suicide by simply being aware of the risk factors and warning signs and asking the potentially lifesaving question: ‘Are you having thoughts of suicide?…”
• Walgreens, Microsoft Announce mHealth, Telehealth Partnership – “enhanced telehealth and mHealth services, digital health stations and a broad platform for connecting consumers, providers and payers…”
• Well/Connected – Susannah Fox – “90% of U.S. teens and young adults living with depressive symptoms say they have gone online for information… Peer to peer health care emerged as one of the most important trends…”
• Why Digital Health System Transformation is No Longer a Choice – Mark Sagon – “removing barriers to preventative care is the responsibility of healthcare institutions… Patients are realizing and demanding better service from their healthcare providers in line with customer service experiences in other industries…

Advocacy

• Body Safety Education – Jayneen Saunders/SWHelper – “statistics, grooming techniques used by predators, and the age-appropriate skills to empower children…”
• Global Social Service Workforce Alliance Interest Group – Advocacy and Outreach – “Social service remains one of the most underfunded, misunderstood, and underappreciated fields of work…  join an exploratory call on January 29 at 09:00 EST…”
• High school students, health education, peer-to-peer – Doin’ The Work w/Valerie Berrin – “kids… listen to their peers… anxiety, depression, attempted suicide… kids are taking the info and passing it to their family members…”
• Introducing the Social Justice Compass – Sam Killermann – “Any particular action, attitude, or belief… will point you in a particular direction… Equity (our “true north”), Learning, Unlearning, and Oppression… As a general rubric, Actions, Attitudes, and Beliefs are equitable when they: promote access; positively impact everyone…”
• An Invitation to Remake Child Welfare – Chronicle Of Social Change/SJS – “government announced that it would permit uncapped, matching federal child welfare funds… to support the representation of parents and children in the child welfare system…”
• Self-Advocacy and Disclosure – ADHD reWired w/LeDerick Horne – “insight into disclosing disabilities, specifically in the workplace… by sharing your strengths, weaknesses, and the accommodations you need and using resources and allies, you can set yourself on a path for success…”
• Starting Conversations with Your Kids about LGBTQ Identities – Ariane Robinson & Marina Spears/Educate Empower Kids – “Hate is learned and perpetuated, and the best way to stop that cycle is to teach that mistreatment of others is wrong… How do we act around LGBTQ indivduals?…”
• Suicide, Guns and Why Research Matters – Sean Erreger & Nikita Joshi – “approximately 2/3 of gun related deaths are suicides… Counseling on Access To Lethal Means (CALM)… Reducing access to lethal means… can determine whether a person at risk for suicide lives or dies…”

Self-Care/Inspiration

• 3 New Year’s Rituals for Nonprofit Professionals to Build Resilience – Beth Kanter – “review the year… themes to guide… professional work… start a new journal…”
• 8-Day REPLENISH Self-Care Challenge – Christina Hibbert – “when you care for YOU, you’ll magically find yourself achieving more goals, feeling happier, and becoming who you desire to be…”
• Make a Date with Yourself for Powerful Self-Care – Morgan Meredith/HealthyPlace – ” Spending intentional time alone helps with self-reflection and getting to know yourself better…”
• Talking about menopause – Laurie Meyers/Counseling Today – “Menopause is part of a process… knowing what to expect in perimenopause can in itself ease some of the discomfort… for menopause-related sleep problems: Stay cool… Eat soy… Try acupuncture…”

Social Work, Technology & Education

• Parent Alert: The Bird Box Challenge – Trishia VanOrden/Educate Empower Kids – “new post-apocalyptic movie… in which people wear blindfolds in order to survive… Ask them [your kids] if they have heard of the challenge and what they think of it…”
• Bias: how much difference does it really make in randomized trials? –  Giorgio Karam – “evidence is unequal for different kinds of bias, e.g., attrition and reporting bias have very little data, and even detection bias has little data on objective outcomes… direction of effect is not always easy to predict…”
• Boosting public perception of science & enabling evidence-based change – Owen Gwydion James – “taking part in the 3MT® competition forces you to step away from the details of that day’s experiment and consider why you’re doing what you’re doing… What impact does your work have in the wider scheme of things?…”
• Changing my grading practices in 2019: Tips for #SocWorkEd – Laurel Hitchcock – “detailed rubric with is available to students from the first day of class… One good source for rubrics… AACU’ Value Rubrics …”
• Cyberbullying Victimization Rates by Race, Sex, and Age – Justin W. Patchin – “multiracial females, both in high school (209.5 out of 1,000) and middle school (186 out of 1,000) are most at risk for experiencing cyberbullying compared to other demographic subgroups…”
• Ethics Alive! Religious Freedom and Social Work – Allan Barsky/New Social Worker – “Although referrals may be justified on the basis of the worker’s skills, the client’s best interests, and the client’s wishes, social workers should avoid making referrals simply because they have religious differences with their clients…”
• Takeaways fr/“The Future of Professions” by Richard & Daniel Susskind – Social Work Futures – “technology and the internet are not just improving old ways of working; they are also enabling us to bring about fundamental change. They are providing new ways to make practical expertise far more widely available…”

NonProfit Career & Private Practice

• 2019 HIPAA Rule Changes – Roy Huggins – “if you want to give some input… you can find the RFI here… They really, really want health care professionals to more freely share records with each other and, where appropriate, with family members and caregivers of people receiving care…”
• Creating a Sound Social Media Policy While Navigating Personal & Professional Life – Selling the Couch w/Keely Kolmes – “social media policy… document for clients to explain how we interact on social media platforms… How to respond to negative Yelp reviews (& the legal ramifications)…”
• How to Handle People Saying Your Price is WRONG – Camille McDaniel – “Know where you will be philanthropic for the year and where you will not… Understand you will not be for everyone and that’s okay…”
• To Impact Millions, the Social Sector Needs to Scale Scaling Up – Greg Coussa – “we need social ventures and their supporters to buy into scaling-impact expertise and demand more of it… social innovations need access to capital similar in size and staging to that which fuels growth in the private sector…”
• Nonprofit Finance Study: What You Need to Know – Michelle Garcia – “growth… is very important to most nonprofit organizations… the search for additional revenue dollars (whether from donations, grants, services, or other sources) is constant…”
• Public Speaking Topics Within Private Practice – Practice of the Practice – “tell interesting stories that pull people in and gives some historical perspective… constantly gather stories and be doing research…”
• SEO and Getting Your Private Practice Website Found – Practice of Therapy w/Jessica Tappana – “using Yoast to boost your SEO… With updated content, Google will bump you up on the rankings…”
• Top 5 Ways Teaching Graduate Students Will Benefit You – Ili Rivera Walter/PsychCentral – “Sifting through textbooks, taking notes, distilling information into stories and activities–these all help you learn your field all over again…”

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