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Learning About Mental Health at School
Black Dog Institute’s Lifespan integrated suicide prevention research project includes an arm of mental health education in schools. The schools-based program is a local adaptation of Youth Aware Mental Health (YAM), a program developed at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. The YAM program has, in longitudinal analyses, been shown to be effective in reducing depression, negative emotional symptoms, conduct problems and suicidal ideation, plans and attempts.
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Ear problems are such a common issue during childhood but like many areas of medicine, a lot of the traditional treatment protocols used in the past were really based on anecdote and opinion rather than high level evidence. There has been a push over the last decade to modernise practice and try to identify more clearly which patients will benefit from grommets (and who doesn’t).
Podcasts are a great way to get a dose of education or relaxation without having to stop whatever else it is you are doing. I listen to This American Life on long drives from one workplace to another, to the BBC Comedy shows while exercising
“Cognitive bandwidth” is a term you may not have heard but a concept that makes sense from the minute you encounter it. We all know that referring a seriously depressed patient for “talking” therapy is probably not going to be very useful. In severe depression, and severe anxiety for that matter, concentration and focus are sufficiently impaired that any attempt to try to think differently, (as cognitive behavioural therapy requires) is fairly futile.
Do you know the other professionals working in mental health in your area? Working in isolation in mental health is a great way to get burnt out. We all need support while we work to support the mental health of others.
It’s Monday morning and you’re already 45 minutes behind. Jessie*, aged 39, walks into your consultation room and promptly bursts into tears. Between sobs she explains that she has reached the end of her tether at work due to “severe bullying” by a co-worker.
In clinical practice many of us see the sad results of homophobia and prejudice. Marriage aside, as GPs we need to know how to help members of the LGBTI community who are experiencing mental health problems.
As websites for adolescents go BITE BACK is a little different. It contains information and psychoeducation seen on the other websites, but has a focus on the positive aspects of life and a level of interactivity not seen elsewhere.
The tag line for the ReachOut site “Help with tough times, sex, friends and drugs” gives a clear indication of its expected user population.
Not every adolescent you see with “adolescent angst” or behavioural problems has a diagnosable mental illness. That doesn’t mean they don’t need your help.