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Countering Stigma Through Education and Outreach
Stigma around mental illness remains an all-too-common occurrence, despite the increased availability of information about mental illnesses and the national discourse on prioritizing mental well-being. While we have made great strides in understanding mental illness, false perceptions of weakness,...
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Co-Creating an Equitable Crisis Care Continuum to Reduce Stigma
People are in pain. We are experiencing an onslaught of public health crises that is affecting our overall functioning. The fierce urgency of now to collectively move us to a space of wellness is imperative to our quality of life. The current crisis care continuum is not designed to meet the needs...
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Mental Health and Families: Working Together to Strengthen and Support Loved Ones
Having a family member diagnosed with a mental illness can cause great stress and a deep sense of isolation. Mental health challenges are difficult to open up about because of the fear of judgment, believing that no one will understand. Relationships with family and friends can be difficult to...
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More Than an Acronym: How LGBTQ+ Health is Transforming Industry
It’s a typical scenario: you walk into the doctor’s office, possibly after several postponements, afraid of what they might find. Will your blood pressure be up? Or maybe your cholesterol, you think. A myriad of possible underlying conditions flash suddenly through your head. But what if,...
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The Behavioral Healthcare System’s Response to Families: A Legacy of Unfulfilled Promises
Family members of those with serious behavioral health conditions often encounter innumerable obstacles in the pursuit of effective treatment and other essential services for their loved ones. Navigating a byzantine network of resources, many of which entail restrictive eligibility criteria and...
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The Evolution of the Behavioral Health Model: 24/7, Walk-Ins, and Crisis and Stabilization Centers
Our communities are in crisis. Mental health and substance use disorders are affecting communities nationwide from all levels of society, without regard for political affiliation, economic status, age, cultural origin, or educational level. Furthermore, the impact of the crisis is particularly...
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Updating Mental or Behavioral Health Language and Design to a Modern Healthcare Approach
More and more today, mental health care is accepted as an optimal course of action for millions of people. Those seeking care anticipate restorative outcomes. As recently as thirty years ago, mental health institutions were referred to in derogatory terms. Many of these secure institutional...
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They Are Us
If the last two years have shown us anything it has shown us how resilient we are. It has also reminded us all just how vulnerable we can be. These are two important truths that are too often overlooked, forgotten, or denied. As we strive to build mental health awareness in our communities, it is...
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Acknowledging the Effects of Intersectional Stigmatization
Our work is devoted to helping health professionals learn different types of stigmas, recognize the effects of stigmatization, and guiding the implementation of effective strategies to assess and address those stigmas in a variety of settings. This article outlines the most common forms of mental...
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Understanding the Impact of Stigma: The Balance Between Choice and Accountability
In contrast to today’s social media saturation, the burgeoning technology of the mid-2,000s was a time of comparative innocence. Similarly, candid conversations around mental health were virtually non-existent. Fewer than five years out of college, I’d recently been forced to resign from my...
