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When Stephanie Brown, a community health worker (CHW) affiliated with a large health care system in Baltimore, sat across from her new client, she thought she’d be teaching the elderly woman to prepare a checklist of questions for her doctor. Instead, the woman nervously admitted that her biggest concern was a waterline break in her house. She and her husband had no money to fix it, so they’d spent weeks wading through standing water. Even worse, they had no clean drinking water. [For more...

“The beauty of being human is that we constantly evolve and change. We have experiences every day that can alter the course of our lives to help us rebuild what was broken and rediscover what was lost. We, as humans, are never irreparably broken because our brains and bodies are built to change and adapt. And young children are often able to change more easily than the rest of us, when makes the earliest years of life the most full of hope. The key to that hope is in relationships.” - Sara...

Under the May 2016 Wall Street Journal headline “Islamic State Bombings Kill Dozens in Baghdad,” we read the following: “The first bomb struck a crowded market in the predominantly Shiite Muslim neighborhood of Sadr City, killing at least 62 people and wounding 86, mostly women and children.” In April , under the Washington Post headline “U.S.-Russia Cooperation Frays as Syria Truce Falls Apart,” we learn that “at least 90 people, including more than two dozen women and children, have been...

It’s an undisputed fact that the United States is the incarceration capital of the world. Despite hosting only 4.4 percent of the world’s population, the U.S. feeds, clothes, and houses nearly 22 percent of the world’s prisoners, or more than two million people. While violent victimization rates are comparable to other advanced Western nations — and crime rates have declined over the last several decades — the U.S.’s incarceration rate far outstrips any other nation on the planet. In fact,...

Retired Army Lt. Col. John Bechtol understands how important it is for veterans on college campuses to have access to mental health services. “To come on campus in your mid-20s after having served, having nothing in common with your peers, it tends to generate feelings of separation,” Bechtol said. Even beyond considerations of post-traumatic stress and other mental health issues, “there’s often just this sense of loneliness, a feeling of being disconnected from their classmates.” As...

With all the parties, outings and family gatherings during the holidays, it's easy for kids to get overwhelmed or lost in the shuffle, a leading group of pediatricians says. Amid the hustle and bustle, parents and caregivers should be mindful of children's safety, the American Academy of Pediatrics advises. While staying in other people's homes, for instance, be aware of potential dangers for little kids, such as decorations that are sharp or breakable. Also watch out for unlocked cabinets,...

A trauma-informed, resilience-building shipyard based in values of authenticity, wholeness, and love? Yes, it's true, and it's located in a small coastal town in Alaska. Watch this 20-minute video made by consultant Tom Mann, who worked closely with Vigor Shipyards General Manager Mike Pearson in Ketchikan, Alaska which tells the remarkable Vigor story: https://youtu.be/i5Ys2zb5L1w

[Photo By Eli Christman - https://www.flickr.com/photos/gammaman/7170043719/, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33160412] “Overall, the researchers found that yoga holds potential promise for helping improve anxiety, depression, PTSD and/or the psychological consequences of trauma”, according to a University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill news-release regarding a study by researchers at its School of Social Work. Release adds that the study “suggested that...

How easy is it to get help with mental health problems in the UK? It’s a topical issue, with reports of long waiting lists and some people being sent miles from home for treatment . Our mental health services are struggling to meet demand – and the government has vowed to invest more money to make improvements in England. The level of care you get appears to vary, depending on where you are. New guidelines recommend that people with anxiety and depression should get talking therapies within...

It's been years in the making, but finally, a plan to help scores of nonviolent, mentally ill people avoid jail and get treatment will take shape in the coming year, Dallas County leaders said Monday. The changes, to be primarily funded with a $7 million private grant, aims to bring fewer mentally ill people to the jail, release more of them while they await trial and connect them with services once they're freed so they don't return. The goal: to facilitate treatment for mentally ill people...

In this sequel to his ‘problem statement,’ outlining the pervasiveness of trauma in our daily South African lives [published on Biznews earlier this week], trauma activist Brian Rogers asks why our public health system has not dealt with psychological trauma, and continues to ignore its’ huge societal costs. As a former News Editor at the SA Medical Journal, I’ve written about the debilitating cost of not treating mental health properly – equal to some two percent of our GDP, UCT’s...

Orange County hopes to get homeless residents into housing – and help them stay there. Riverside County plans to connect former inmates with health clinics and social services. Placer County is opening a respite center where homeless patients can go after they leave the hospital. Those are just some of the pilot projects in a $3 billion experimental effort officials hope will improve the health of California’s most vulnerable populations. The effort is a recognition that improving people’s...