July 2020

Everyone experiences flashbacks. Most of the time flashbacks are benign when they experience a trigger, such as the smell of fresh-baked bread, and it reminds them of their grandmother. However, flashbacks are a nightmare for those who have experienced extreme trauma in childhood or as an adult. This piece will concentrate on flashbacks that are part of the lives of those who live in the shadow of complex post-traumatic stress disorder.

By Oxiris Barbot and Daniel Stephens, MedPage Today, June 29, 2020 From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have grappled with the impact of this crisis on children. Many of us think children are uniquely resilient, able to bounce back from anything. But like all pediatricians, we know that children are not simply small adults. Children and adolescents are experiencing acute mental trauma right now -- especially as the pandemic continues alongside mounting protests and civic unrest.

By Shashank Bengali and Zulfiqar Ali, Los Angeles Times, June 30, 2020 The boys struck out from their village in Pakistan’s rugged tribal belt and came to this frontier city to work at Maula Khan’s drink stand, a wooden cart shaded by an umbrella on a road bustling with migrants, war refugees and swerving rickshaws. Umar Gul and Muhammad Siraj stood in the 108-degree heat, pouring freshly squeezed lemons mixed with jaggery into steel cups for 12 cents a serving. They were far from home, but...

By May-Ying Lam, The Washington Post, June 30, 2020 For women who are pregnant amid a pandemic, a recession and racial turmoil, the future is an anxiety-stirring unknown. They began their pregnancies in the “other world” that promised baby showers, gender-reveal parties, visits with grandparents and browsing stores for onesies. Now, they contemplate how they would handle a novel coronavirus diagnosis, prepare to give birth while wearing a mask and fight through old traumas that the virus has...

By Alvin Chang, WSJ Noted, June 30, 2020 In early April, Erin Payne drove to the group home in southwest Ohio where she cares for two men with serious disabilities. Normally, the 21-year-old would blare country music to keep her awake on her 40-minute commute. That day, she drove in silence. “I was absolutely terrified,” she said. She was returning to her position as a home health aide after six weeks of maternity leave, during which the coronavirus outbreak turned into a pandemic. Soon, she...

Sorry folks, APA doesn't have this up their website yet. https://www.counseling.org/news/updates/2020/07/01/july-is-minority-mental-health-month

By Al Donato, June 30, 2020, Huff Post. Every time Asante Haughton leaves his home, he sees someone in distress. For the Jamaican-born mental health advocate , encountering a person experiencing homelessness going through a bad mental health episode in public happens often in his Toronto neighbourhood. What’s also common, Haughton said, is seeing them become victims when police get involved. “People get tackled to the ground, hogtied, choked out and beat up because someone called the police...

By Michael Burke, EdSource, July 1, 2020 Los Angeles Unified will cut $25 million from its school police, reducing the department’s budget by more than one-third following several weeks of protests from Black students and activists who have called on the district to reform its police force. The district’s school board voted 4-3 late Tuesday to make the cuts, which will take effect immediately in L.A. Unified’s 2020-21 budget and result in the layoffs of 65 officers, in addition to...

By Betty Marquez Rosales, EdSource, July 1, 2020 With reduced work hours and a baby on the way, Maraya Bermudez stocks up on groceries for the week at the food pantry on her community college campus. She frequented the Fullerton College food pantry sparingly during the school year, but she now goes every week to pick up bags that often include rice, beans, vegetables, fruits, milk and snacks. A former foster youth, she has also been eligible for debit cards from her college that she can use...

By Clyde W. Yancy, MD, MSc 1 , JAMA. Published June 30, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.12532 E choes of “medicine as the noble profession” continue to resonate, now 35 years since my legendary Chair of Medicine imbued me with this guiding ethos. Nobility in medicine is not obsolete; the selflessness, courage, self-sacrifice, and altruism on gallant display in the response to COVID-19 reassures that at its core, this ethic of egalitarian service remains intact and deeply established in the DNA...

Resilient Georgia recently presented a roundtable discussion, featuring a distinguished panel of professionals, on the trauma associated with racism and racial discrimination, as part of the Mental Fitness for Resilience Campaign. The distinguished panel for this Georgia Public Broadcasting production included Dr. Patrice Harris, MD, MA, psychiatrist and the first African-American woman to be elected president of the American Medical Association; Dr. Terri McFadden, a General Pediatrician...

By Jillian Wilson, 07/01/2020 05:45am EDT on HuffPost.com In mental health training and treatment, examining the impact of racism on brains and bodies is largely uncharted territory. And while, in recent years, clinicians who advocate for the study of race-based trauma have made strides in promoting this work, most mental health programs still do not offer official training around racial trauma — a debilitating effect of racism and discrimination. Racial trauma comprises the mental and...