Portrait of happy woman wearing bathing cap and snorkel, lake in backgroundYou may be happy to hear that the United States is inching its way up on the world happiness scale. But Denmark is still “smiles” above us as the happiest nation.

The UN’s World Happiness Report 2016 Update lists the U.S. as the 13th happiest country. That’s two spots ahead of last year. Holding steady in the top five are:
Denmark
Switzerland
Iceland
Norway
Finland
The researchers found people are happier in places where folks spread good cheer evenly. So despite the cold, Scandinavians have warmed up to sharing their happiness. Their societies boast strong safety nets, which seem to boost happiness.

Happiness measures may mean better public policy
Though the topic may seem lighthearted, it’s no joke. Societies worldwide are paying attention to data on happiness and well-being. It helps them embrace policies that support better lives. And researchers say measuring happiness tells them more about how well a society lives than other factors, such as income and education.

This New York Times article has more on the World Happiness Conference.

img Get high quality care from our special network

Grandson holding flowers behind his back for his Grandmother sitting on a sofaOver the years gastric bypass, cardiac surgery and knee replacement surgery have become fairly common.

But all surgery carries some risk. So it’s important to choose a hospital known for providing quality care.

To simplify your choice, we’ve put together a network of hospitals that specialize in these procedures. We call these facilities the Aetna Institutes of Quality.

What makes these facilities different?
To become part of Aetna’s Institutes of Quality® (IOQ) network, facilities must meet strict standards for care, quality and efficiency. We measure many factors. Everything from level of care to how often patients return to the hospital after surgery.

For complete information on the selection criteria visit the IOQ fact book at http://www.aetna.com/individuals-families-health-insurance/document-library/aetna-ioq-factbook.pdf.

How to find the Institutes of Quality
Log in to your secure member Aetna Navigator® website at www.aetna.com. And search for Institutes of Quality. You can also call the phone number on your ID card. Confirm benefits and ask if your plan covers travel and lodging benefits.

img Your mental health matters

Couple sitting on sofa with a laptop discussing a billMay is Mental Health Awareness Month. We’re working to overcome the stigma around mental health challenges. We do this by providing support and education.

Join the conversation on social media
Throughout the month, you’ll find information and resources on our social media channels. Look for us on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and LinkedIn. You can share how you stay emotionally healthy on social media with the hashtag #mentalhealthmatters. And be sure to join use for a live Twitter chat on May 26 from 2 – 3 p.m. ET by using #mhmchat. Together, we can raise awareness and reduce stigma.

Helpful resources on our website
You’ll find:
Depression and anxiety self-assessments
Quick tips to improve your mood
Information about mental health conditions
?It only takes a minute’ videos showing how others stay healthy
Just visit us at www.aetnabehavioralhealth.com.

There’s no health without mental health. Come celebrate with us this month!

img Know someone who is at risk for opioid overdose?

Couple holding hands Opioids include pain killers prescribed by your doctor and illegal drugs such as heroin. Opioid overdose can occur when someone misuses these drugs. It should not occur when taken as directed by your doctor.

Did you know?
Since 1999, the number of prescription painkillers prescribed and sold in the U.S. has nearly quadrupled.1
Opioid overdoses tripled between 2001 and 2013.2,3
About 15 million people suffer from opioid dependence. But, only 10 percent who need treatment are getting it.4
Naloxone (brand name Narcan®) is an inexpensive medicine and may help. If administered early, it may reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. And, it can prevent deaths due to an overdose.

You can reduce the risk
Get help to quit and stay clean.
Find out how to obtain naloxone for those likely to go through an opioid overdose.
Receive support, resources and training.
Learn when and how to use naloxone as a life-saving medicine.
Help is available
Our clinicians work with providers to screen those at risk. They promote education and treatment for you, your loved ones, caregivers and health care providers. Contact your healthcare provider if you have questions. And you can call the member services number on your ID card to check your benefits for naloxone.

Resources
Opioid overdose prevention toolkit
Opioid overdose information
1Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2015), http://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/
2Beletsky LB, Rich JD,Walley AY. Prevention of fatal opioid overdose. JAMA. 2012;308(18):1863-1864.
3National Institute on Drug Abuse, Overdose Death Rates, Revised February 2015, https://www.drugabuse.gov/related-topics/trends-statistics/overdose-death-rates
4World Health Organization (November 2014), http://www.who.int/substance_abuse/information-sheet/en/

img Get help for depression and substance abuse

Make the most of your health care budgetWoman laying on sofa looking off into distance
It’s hard to know where to turn when you or a loved one is struggling. If you have depression, it can interfere with daily life and cause pain for both you and those who care about you. Many people with depression can also have an alcohol or drug problem.

Help is available
If you ignore these conditions, they can get worse. An assessment may help you and your doctor decide if you need treatment. Both depression and substance abuse are treatable conditions. If you think you need help, just talk to your doctor. Or find one in your area.

Simply log in to your secure member Aetna Navigator® website at www.aetna.com. It’s an important first step on the road to feeling better.

Check out these resources
You can:
Find tips to boost your mood and assess your well-being
Look up facts about common drugs of abuse
Call the suicide prevention hotline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or visit the lifeline online
Let us help you take care of your mind, body and spirt.

Find more information at https://www.aetna.com/individuals-families/mental-emotional-health.html.

https://www.isp.com/blog/lgbtq-youth-online-resources/

The post Your mental well-being matters! appeared first on Good News!.

See the Faces and Listen to the Stories of Our Society’s Most Overlooked Outcasts:

The Mentally Ill and Homeless http://www.robertokinmd.com

From L.A. to Philly to Miami, they’re out there—pushing their carts, digging through garbage, sleeping on park benches, sometimes ranting about nonsense to no one. They often look and sound crazy, smell bad, and make us uneasy, so we avoid them. We know better intellectually, yet most of us shun people suffering from homelessness and mental illness because we view them as deeply flawed—somehow less human than the rest of us.

As part of his career devoted to the mentally disabled, Dr. Robert Okin decided to use a powerful artistic medium to advocate for these people. In SILENT VOICES: People with Mental Disorders on the Street (Golden Pine Press, October 2014), Dr. Okin invites all of us to get to know the people society treats like pariahs, people who, beneath their symptoms and rags, struggle with feelings and needs similar to those of the rest of us. He shares the striking and evocative photographs and stories—most often, in their own words—of more than 40 mentally ill people he met on the streets of San Francisco. “I wrote this book,” Dr. Okin reflects, “to contribute to making these people known as human beings.”

SILENT VOICES offers a glimpse of the dark pasts—marked by abuse, violation, tragedies, crime, drugs, and addiction—and everyday challenges of homeless men and women suffering from bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and other serious mental disabilities.

Based on his interviews, research, and decades of professional experience, Dr. Okin discusses:

 Staggering facts on how the mentally ill are neglected, mistreated, and discriminated against. In America today, over 200,000 people with mental disorders are abandoned in the streets and another 250,000 are locked up in jails and prisons.

 Measures needed to reduce the widespread, escalating problem of the homeless mentally ill, including increased government funding for affordable housing, partnerships between the public and private sector to provide job training, and legal reform.

 The critical need for well-trained, dedicated professional clinical case managers. “Without excellent clinical case managers, a mental health system will tend to be mechanistic, inaccessible, and exclusively focused on the management of symptoms with medication, rather than also on clients’ human development and rehabilitation,” Dr. Okin asserts.

 What everyone can do to overcome the stigma of mental illness and prevent homelessness, with the goal of not just social acceptance for people with mental illness but genuine inclusion in society. “Treatment cannot occur first and inclusion second,” stresses Dr. Okin.

Robert L. Okin, MD, served as chief of psychiatry at San Francisco General Hospital and professor of clinical psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco, for 17 years. He is also a former state commissioner of mental health for both Vermont and Massachusetts. Throughout his career, he developed crucial services and clinical case management programs to enable mentally ill people to live with dignity in the community. A member of the board of advisors of Disabilities Rights International (DRI), he has provided psychiatric advocacy and consultation for missions to Mexico and Turkey, among many other countries, to investigate human rights violations in mental institutions. He lives in San Francisco.

I hope you will be moved, uplifted, and outraged by the stories in SILENT VOICES.

Dr. Robert Okin, Author of SILENT VOICES

1. You’ve forged relationships with the homeless, but you’re a trained psychiatrist. What can the average person do to help a homeless person they see on the street?

It is true that I was able to forge such relationships, but I don’t think this primarily resulted from any particular skill I had as a psychiatrist. It was more the result of my openness and expressed interest in the people I met. This may sound corny, but saying a simple “Hello, I hope you have a good day” or “I wish you well” is probably the best and easiest thing to do. It won’t change the actual living conditions of the homeless people, but at least it will make them feel that they’re not invisible. It would be great if you could follow up with an e-mail to your city supervisors and congressperson about the need for supportive housing for homeless people. And if you really want to move this project forward, get your friends to send e-mails as well.

2. What is the root of society’s fear and stigmatization of mental illness?

Some of society’s fear comes from the strangeness and unpredictability people associate, sometimes correctly, with mental illness. Because mentally ill people seem strange, it’s hard for us to empathize with them and to remember that they were once children with hopes and dreams like our own. At a deeper level, people have always projected the most feared and hated parts of themselves onto those who have mental illness. Mentally ill people become the living representation of the most disavowed parts of ourselves and thus become stigmatized. Not wanting to be reminded of these parts of ourselves, we, as a society, have burned these people, drowned them, isolated them in mental hospitals, and put them away in jails where we can’t see them. But those who become homeless and aren’t put out of sight evoke in us responses that cause us to avoid them in other ways: basically, we close our eyes to them.

3. Did you have any preconceived ideas about the homeless? What was your biggest misconception about them?

I expected to be dismissed and rejected when I reached out to them. I was a stranger, so I assumed they wouldn’t want to talk with me. I also assumed that if they did, they wouldn’t reveal their feelings. I was wrong on all counts. Most of the people I met genuinely welcomed my overtures and quickly warmed up to me. I was repeatedly surprised at how much grief these people were carrying just under the surface and how willing they were to reveal it to me. More than anything else, I was reminded of just how human and vulnerable these people are. I easily identified with and felt close to them. At the end of a day of talking with them, I felt sad, wrung out, and anxious about my grip on my own financial and emotional security.

4. How did your own opinions change after meeting and getting to know some of them?

I developed an abiding admiration for many of them—I respected how they were willing to continue living, despite the brutal conditions they were dealing with day after day. I often wondered if I would have the grit and the courage to stick it out if I were in their position. I don’t know if I could stand living their lives and dealing with the hopelessness most of them feel.

5. What percentage of the homeless suffer from mental illness?

Approximately 25 percent primarily have severe and chronic mental illness and another 15 percent have significant drug abuse disorders.

6. What can city and state governments do to help the homeless mentally ill integrate back into society?

First, these people need supportive, supervised housing and a sufficient income that allows them to escape the deprivations of poverty. Without housing, any other intervention is ineffective. Second, they need case management from a social worker with a relatively small caseload who has the time to meet them where they live, provide a loving human connection with them, help them with their daily tasks (laundry, shopping, budgeting), help them reduce their drug intake, and when indicated, help them to be evaluated by a psychiatrist to get them on psychiatric medications. These social workers also have to play a major advocacy role in helping their clients rejoin society. And third, the homeless mentally ill need something productive to do during the day—some sort of job.

The post Dr. Robert Okin appeared first on Good News!.