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Towards Seamless Integration: Advocating for Reform
Many people with serious mental illnesses have difficulty accessing primary care or do not feel comfortable in primary care settings, for a host of reasons. Often, they have experienced trauma, resulting in trust issues that impact their ability to form relationships with new providers. As a...
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Drinking for Two: Why We Need to Prevent Alcohol Use During Pregnancy
It was forty years ago that Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) was first diagnosed by Drs. David Smith and Kenneth Jones at the University of Washington, when a group of babies born to different mothers who consumed alcohol during pregnancy were noticed to have similar physical and behavioral problems....
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Suffering from Mental Illness in the Orthodox Jewish Community
After being diagnosed with bipolar disorder, I had a tough time being accepted, especially in the Orthodox Jewish community. You see, I am an Orthodox woman – I keep my head covered, dress modestly, keep kosher, observe the Sabbath and Jewish holidays, and am readily identified as an observant...
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Murders and Mental Health Advocacy: Opportunity or Temptation to Resist?
From time-to-time, a person with a severe mental illness (or assumed to have a mental illness) commits a heinous act that makes headlines. The reactive call for better mental health services is entirely predictable, not only on the part of those who are trying to distract us from issues such as gun...
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How Can We Fight the Prejudice and Discrimination of Psychiatric Labels?
Raptly watching President Obama’s inaugural address on January 21, I was struck by his acknowledgement – on equal terms – of three stunning civil rights milestones: Seneca Falls, Selma, and Stonewall. The Stonewall Inn, of course, is the gay bar where, in 1969, a police raid sparked several...
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Peer Training and Empowerment at the Howie the Harp Advocacy Center: Keeping Pace with a Bigger, Stronger Peer Movement
Without meaning to stretch the analogy too far, there was perhaps something rather apt—albeit unfortunate—about the 17th Annual Howie the Harp Advocacy Center (HTH) Graduation Ceremony being delayed three months because of Hurricane Sandy. It was originally scheduled for October 29, 2012, the...
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Making Recovery More Than Just a Word
Over the past 50 years, the mental health system in New York City has evolved from a system of dependent care to a more person-centered system. But there is still much work to be done. Employment rates for people living with mental illness are still abysmally low….unemployment for people with...
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Can New York State Healthcare Reforms Advance Recovery?
In 1971, I spent 6 weeks in a Long Island hospital psychiatric ward for severe depression, the beginning of my long and rewarding personal recovery journey. In the ensuing years, I learned hard lessons about the great limitations of traditional treatments and the critical role hope, dignity, work,...
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From the Publisher: Health Reform Must Not Jeopardize the People We Serve
Budget cutting has become a top priority for virtually all political leaders from the President on down to every Governor, County Executive, and Mayor in the land. As a result, health care reform and the effort to transform America’s behavioral health systems to promote recovery (both of which...
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OMH’s Mental Health Services Restructuring: A Commentary
The Coalition of Behavioral Health Agencies has been gratified to be an active participant in the stakeholder process established and nurtured by the New York State Office of Mental Health (SOMH). For close to five years, we have maintained that restructuring of clinic reimbursement and attendant...
