Best in Mental Health (5/16/16 – 6/5/16)

Mental Health Roundup

This contains some of the latest news in social work, healthcare, private practice and more!

This week’s wrap-up has 5 main themes:

• Advocacy/NonProfit
• Healthcare
• Therapy/Relationships
• Self-Care
• Career/Private Practice

Advocacy/NonProfit

• 5 Ways the Internet of Things Could Transform Fundraising – Heather Mansfield – “In the coming years the social good sector will launch #IoT apps that will empower real-time giving while watching TV or listening to radio through your refrigerator…”
  • 12 Common Criticisms of Philanthropy—and Some Answers – Karl Zinsmeister – “Charitable aid should focus on the poor… donors… follow their passions… effective way of inspiring powerful commitments and getting big results…”
  • Free Therapy Movement of Give an Hour – Chris Lyford – “Using an online database, prospective clients… easily locate a nearby therapist who specialized in treating… to assist clinicians unaccustomed to military culture, Give an Hour provided them with resources…”
  • Help for The Refugee Crisis-What You & Your Family Can Do – Christina Hibbert – “Hayley Smith, founder of Lifting Hands International, a non-profit that serves refugees… many ways to serve–from caring for your own young children, to helping others with their children, to joining a local food drive…”
  • Is Facebook’s One-Click Donate Button a Game Changer? – Allyson Kapin – “When a donor clicks on the donate button they will get a popup with donation amounts… FB is rolling out its own crowdfunding platform…”
• 10 Reasons I’m Not Afraid to Use Trans-Friendly Bathrooms – Julie Hanks – “I have no fear of using a restroom with a transgender woman; I am fearful of sexual predators… stopping the glorification of violence and our cultural obsession with sex…”
  • The Mental Health of Trans People – Danna Bodenheimer – “Clinically, it can be seductive to enter the fantasy that trans people are living in an increasingly more supportive and open world… Not every trans person struggles equally, and some are more in danger than others…”
• Academic-Community Partnerships: Barriers to and Strategies For Success – Sunya Folayan and #MacroSW held a chat to address questions: Why is collaboration important? …What principles/strategies foster successful academic- community collaboration?… current examples…catch up with archive.
• Can We Talk About Whiteness? – Code Switch podcast about the importance of figuring out how to talk about whiteness and understand how it shapes our culture and politics.
• Critiquing Child Welfare – ckhayek – “ways to get involved… Become a CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) Volunteer… Become a Foster Parent… Become a Foster Grandparent… Provide Respite Foster Care… if you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem‘
• No Hungry Kids: Congresswoman Lee & 110 Members Call on Congress to Have a Conscience – SWH – “With more than one in five American children living in poverty, we should be expanding opportunity to poor kids – not taking it away…”
• “No One Asked About My Children”: Voices of Incarcerated Mothers – inSocialWork podcast interview with Dr. Caroline Long Burry about a pilot study she conducted with incarcerated mothers to better understand their parenting experiences and their attempts to negotiate the criminal justice system.
• Shamespiration – JaeRan Kim – “the use of a photo image of a person with a disability who is excelling at something… as a motivator for those of us who are able-bodied…shaming people as inspiration… reduces the ability for us to have true empathy for others, and doesn’t acknowledge that some of us have more privileges than others… “
• Tracking Outcomes & Demonstrating Your Organization’s Social Impact – SideProject & #MacroSW held a chat to address questions: What is program evaluation?… What is a logic model?… What are some evaluation resources… catch up with archive.
• How can digital technology help a person living with multiple sclerosis? – Shirley Ayres –  “ AbilityNet ... charity helping disabled adults and children use computers and the internet by adapting… their technology…using a computer if you have tremors…”
• Your Outrage At The $15 An Hour Crowd is Misdirected – Relando Thompkins-Jones – “Businesses who scapegoat the human beings whose labor they could not exist without in an attempt to avoid their responsibility to adequately compensate those human beings for their labor are the ones we should be boycotting…”
  • To help low-income American households, we have to close the “work gap” – “gulf in labor market income between the haves and have-nots remains wide… most important reason for the low incomes of the bottom third is… that many are not employed at all, or work limited hours…”

Healthcare

• Childhood maltreatment and bipolar disorder – Emily Currell – ” childhood maltreatment is associated with an unfavourable course of bipolar disorder in adult years…”
• Couples study ties anger to heart problems, stonewalling to back pain – Science Daily -“findings reveal a new level of precision in how emotions are linked to health, and how our behaviors over time can predict the development of negative health outcomes…”
• Is parenthood beneficial for later life cognition? – Sanna Read and Emily Grundy – “parents had higher cognitive functioning than childless men and women. Moreover, those women who experienced their last birth after turning 35 also exhibited higher cognitive functioning in later life…”
• Using Meditation to Help Close the Achievement Gap – Norman E. Rosenthal – “major factor preventing underserved children from learning is the stress they encounter on a daily basis… poverty… Transcendental Meditation… inexpensive intervention… preliminary data suggest is effective…”
• Yoga May Be Good for the Brain – Gretchen Reynolds -“weekly routine of yoga and meditation may strengthen thinking skills and help to stave off aging-related mental decline…”
• Your medical records are a gold mine for cybercriminals – KevinMD – “Read your Explanation of Benefits (EOBs) that are sent from your health insurance plan… Monitor your credit reports and billing statements for errors… Turn off your computer at night…”

Therapy/Relationships

• Coping With Mean Girl Behavior: A Talk With Annie Fox, M.Ed. – Mercedes Samudio – “be real with your daughter and say you have that option [exit when you want to leave]… Be prepared for some pushback… and sweetheart if you’ve got nobody… it’s better to be on your own…”
• Extract from The Autism Spectrum Guide to Sexuality and Relationships – Dr Emma Goodall – “People on the autism spectrum can find it more difficult to understand their sexuality as it involves not just self-awareness but an understanding of others and how we best interact with and t in with others…”
• Got Anger? Try HEArt Anger Management! – [own] –  based upon his work with Veterans, Howard Lipke, Ph.D. developed a unique anger prevention system; basic premise is that we often use anger as a defense to avoid experiencing another hidden emotion…”
• Interventions: The Screenshot – therapydoc – “Much of therapy is about finding ways to stop something or to start something… an example, an intervention I thought up working with a client who wanted to lose weight…”
• Keeping up with #HackFosterCare – Stuck on Social Work – “The White House… various stakeholders to examine how technology can assist in improving foster care… ideas… to provide education, engage youth, recruit/retain foster parents, and facilitate communication…”
• Make a Success Handbook to Solidify Progress in Therapy –  Lisa Mitchell – “have clients create a page in their success handbook each time they reported a gain in therapy… Used art making as an alternative to self harm… Put a marker in my hand instead of a razor…”
• Narrative Therapy: Developing a Richer Story of Your Life –  Mauricio P. Yabar – “Many people are unaware of the social messages they have received throughout their lives… identify if there is any evidence supporting these notions…”
• Raising counselors’ awareness of micro aggressions – Priscilla G. Wilson – “minority clients are 50 percent more likely to prematurely terminate counseling… Cultural awareness and introspection… become cognizant of microaggressions and address slights that may occur in the counseling relationship…”
• Sexting: Advice for Teens – Sameer Hinduja and Justin W. Patchin – “Sharing pictures with romantic partners is a natural part of any relationship… Think twice before taking an explicit picture of yourself, or sending one of yourself—or someone else—to another person…”
• Supervision Issues in Cognitive Therapy – Judith S. Beck – “I stress the importance of using the conceptualization to plan treatment within individual sessions… How can I help this patient feel better by the end of the session?… How can I help this patient have a better week?…”
• Therapies for OCD – All in the Mind podcast – “recent research shows that family can play a critical role in treatment and recovery…the role of exposure and response prevention is is to expose the individual gradually to their triggering situations…”
• Tools to Promote Social Communication – thesocialworkpad – “Adobe spark… Students used the skills of: collaborating, making decisions, taking turns, using reciprocal conversation, waiting, expressing ideas…”
• The Many Elements of Comprehensive Sexuality– Sam Killermann – “Sexualitree is a model that can help us see the different ways we experience (or don’t experience) sexuality…What comprises one’s experience of intimate sexuality is constantly changing…”
• Two Financial Tools Which Empower Others to Achieve Long-Term Financial Behavioral Change – SJS/Reeta Wolfsohn – “the P.S.S.P. (Personal Spending and Savings Plan) and Money Mission Statement… instead of figuring out where your money went each month, you decide ahead of time where your money is going to go…”
• Who am I? Why do I know about therapeutic writing? – Dima Dupéré –  My first training in therapeutic writing happened in 1995 with a process called The Living Journal Process TM… based on the work of Ira Progoff who … a group process… involved a theme, guided meditation, specific writing exercises and some group sharing…”
• Writing Less is Writing More: Reducing the length of your notes – Maelisa Hall – “template, like DAP (Data, Assessment, Plan)… sticking to the most important facts… focus on what… Data section means… need to be working on… Leave out subjective language…  consider how…  client would feel reading…”

Self-Care

• Are You a Highly Sensitive Person? – Sharon Martin – “Look for aspects of  your sensitive nature that are an asset… Limit exposure to overwhelming stimulus… Be careful not to over-schedule yourself… Set boundaries… Journal…”
  • How To Connect Your Mind and Body: Sensory Activities Resources –  Stephen Borgman – “Create A Sensory Toolkit… pinpoint your particular sensory challenges… Indiana University sensory integration is full of sensory activities…”

• Art as Self-Care, The Art of Self-Care – Danna Bodenheimer – “When we are most depleted, self-care is the hardest… creating a habit out of it makes it potentially healing in a more sustainable manner… Self-care should allow us to engage with parts of ourselves in an unpressured, unhurried, and non-competitive way…”
• Entrepreneur Burnout – Is It Inevitable? – Therapy Chat podcast interview with Colleen Mullen – “burnout is an occupational hazard for entrepreneurs… some ways to identify when you are at risk for burnout, and some strategies to avoid entrepreneur burnout…”
• Healing From Client-Related Trauma – Allison Puryear – “Part of healing from these experiences is working through the frustration with the response… create a game plan now for IF it happens… taking some time off… seeing a therapist… body based self-care… we need a sense of safety…”
• How Even Non-Artists Can Use Art Journaling to Relieve Stress – Amy Johnson Maricle – “give yourself permission to play… let go of the idea that you need to end up with an “adult piece of art”… scribble drawing… close your eyes and move your hand around the page… “
• Reduce Anxiety by Getting Out into Nature – Tanya J. Peterson – “Nature relaxes the mind, thus reducing feelings of stress and anxiety… reduces the amount of stress hormones… Make it a regular habit to create time to get out and be active…”

Career/Private Practice

• Five Things I Have Learned About Websites This Week – Cathy Hanville – “Don’t rush to try and fix it. Some things just self heal… More back up is better back up…”
• 7 Reasons Why I’m Writing A Book About Really Wealthy Social Workers – Eva Forde – “I will set out to interview at least 15 of the wealthiest social workers I can find… entitled Six Figure Social Worker: Do the Work You Love, Reclaim Your Time, and Earn What You’re Worth On Your Own Terms.“
• 8 Week Mini Business School for Therapists Bootcamp – ZynnyMe –  “every Friday… free organized, focused series of trainings that build off one another…”
• Comparing public perceptions of social work and social workers’ expectations of the public view – Barbara Staniforth, Kesley Deane and Liz Beddoe – “social workers generally had a poorer impression of what the public believed in most areas… there is stigma associated with social work… not particularly well represented by the media…”
• Did You Ever Leave Your Day Job to Run Your Business Full-Time? – Nicole Clark – “there will never be a “perfect” time…Yes, make sure you have enough income to sustain yourself… that your business idea is something that you can provide value with and profit from…”
• Dispatches from the Field with Graduating Student Frank Garcia-Ornelis – “inmates spend 23 hours per day in isolation; for this reason, once per week, Garcia-Ornelas speaks with them to ensure that they are mentally stable…”
• Guide for People with Mental Health Conditions Who Want to Work – Temple University Collaborative – “many people with mental health conditions are able to work successfully if they receive the supports they need and want…”
• How do I start offering webinars to build my email list for my therapy practice? – Ask Juliet & Clinton – “when you are thinking about building a list… have the sign up forms… make sure they stand out… using webinars… is an advanced list building strategy… “
• A report on the 2016 Social Work Day at the UN – SocialWorkSynergy – “Attending this event gave me the opportunity to speak to others in the field of social work about international social work as well as connect and exchange resources and ideas…”
• Social Work Student Asks What Satisfies Middle Managers – David Vincent, PhD – “dissertation… when managers’ social justice sensitivity aligned with the mission of the organization, their job satisfaction was high, as was job retention…”
• Tech Countertransference And The One Question You Need To Be Asking Yourself – Roy Huggins – “Email is not a secure means of communication, and you cannot protect the confidentiality of emails… how does that make you feel?…free CE course on HIPAA security.
• Using Public Speaking to Grow Your Private Practice – Selling the Couch podcast interview with Corey Busch – “Look at your existing contacts… to begin public speaking work… struggles that your audience goes through and how to address them… niche down to a specific content or… audience”
• Wall Street to Therapist with Keith Kurlander from Higher Practice – PracticeofthePractice interview -“people who know you will advocate for you… specialize… growth rate… much faster… think where are your clients hanging out… online and offline… expand this to the symptoms that people are struggling with…”
• What is CAQH? – Samara Stone – “Council for Affordable Quality Health Care… non-profit FREE online platform… first step in the credentialing process with many insurance companies…”

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