Mental Health Notes - News, Education and Advocacy

Saturday Sanity: What A Busy Week!

by Alicia Sparks, Mental Health Notes on November 8th, 2008

Wow, what a week it has been, my friends. The weather here has been sunny and in the upper 60s/lower 70s (which Chopper loved), I found a ridiculously inexpensive and surprisingly potent scented oil while wandering aimlessly around Wal-Mart (mmm, Christmasy cinnamon), and I finally found the name of the song on one of the new Blackberry commercials (it’s “Live the Proof” by Jim Boggia, if anyone’s interested. It’s great. Seriously.).

And, of course, we Americans elected our leader for the next four years. Something I (but not Chopper) found even more exciting than the rest of it.

So, what else went down this week?

This week at Mental Health Notes, in addition to questions about physician-assisted suicide and a review of Lumosity, quite a few famous names were the topic of discussion, including William Shatner, Brooke Smith, Maurice Benard, and Barack Obama.

Regarding mental health advocacy, educational opportunities abound. It may be too late to attend the Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance’s 3rd Annual Rebecca’s Dream Gala, but the DBSA is currently accepting registrations for both the Peer Specialist Training 5-Day Course and the next Peer Specialist Continuing Education (CE) Webinar, “Trauma-Informed Care: What the Peer Specialist Needs to Know.” Too, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is promoting the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s (SAMHSA) free teleconference training, “Children’s Mental Health Problems and the Need for Social Inclusion.”

In the world of mental health news, 92% of the 1,137 people who took a ComPsych Corp survey claim economic woes contribute to their sleeplessness, depressed African-American heart patients are less likely than depressed Caucasian heart patients to be on antidepressants, and young ADHD patients are more likely to become addicted to nicotine. But, there’s some good news, too: Kidney transplants may improve mental performance (keep in mind this is good news for patients with kidney disease and related cognitive impairment - so, not something any ol’ body should go rounding up friends and scheduling a kidney domino theory over.

Here at b5media’s Health & Wellness Channel, my fellow bloggers are chatting it up about lots of interesting stuff:

• Mark gives a list of important A.A. history dates for November at A Dozen Steps.
• Mary Emma at Alzheimer’s Notes has a guest post from Dee regarding easy finger foods for Alzheimer’s patients.
• Kristina talks about two studies regarding autism genetics at Autism Vox.
• Cherie rounds up a list of giveaways at Diabetes Notes.
• Grace tells us about how seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is linked to a mutation at Genetics & Health.
• Scott talks about bullies (and his method for handling them, ha) at Health and Men.

That’s all for this week’s Saturday Sanity!

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POSTED IN: Government & Politics, Resources