Benefits Of Electroshock For Some Depression Patients Outweigh Risks: FDA
In other mental health treatment news, free counseling is offered by black doctors in Atlanta for racial trauma and in Minneapolis for children coping with a loss while groups find that kids and seniors both benefit from intergenerational activities.
The Washington Post:
FDA: Electroshock Has Risks But Is Useful To Combat Severe Depression
After years of consideration, the Food and Drug Administration has determined that for carefully selected patients with profound depression, the benefits of electroconvulsive therapy, long demonized, outweigh the risks of possible memory loss caused by its use. Citing evidence from 60 randomized trials of ECT, once known as electroshock therapy, the FDA acknowledged the risk but said that there is now enough evidence to ease access to the therapy for certain people. (Hurley, 7/18
Stat:
Can A Stint In The ‘Fever Machine’ Treat Depression? This Psychiatrist Aims To Find Out
One night, (Charles) Raison’s companion told him about a meditation practice called “tummo,” a kind of fast track to enlightenment. Using only breathing and visualization techniques, he said, monks raised their body temperatures to feverish levels — so high that their body heat could steam dry sheets dipped in an icy Himalayan lake. Raison was entranced. At that moment, he decided he would study how body temperature connected to feelings of bliss. That conversation would lead to decades of research — and a controversial idea for treating depression by putting patients inside a machine that induces fever. (Boodman, 7/19)
WABE:
Black Doctors Offer Free Therapy Space For Racial Trauma
It's been nearly a week of daily protests in Atlanta since the fatal shootings in Baton Rouge, Falcon Heights and Dallas. For many, those protests have included a form of collective grieving. On Wednesday night, a group of mental health professionals invited members of the black community to address difficult feelings with their help, for free. WABE spoke to psychologist Ifetayo Ojelade before the meeting she helped organize, which was closed to the media. (Hagen, 7/14)
Pioneer Press:
Free Grief Counseling For Kids Comes To North Minneapolis
Fairview Health Care has expanded its grief support program for children to North Minneapolis. The health system facilitates a free series that is one of the few resources in the Twin Cities to help children and families cope after the loss of a parent, grandparent or sibling or someone else close. It’s been offered twice a year in Burnsville and once a year in South Minneapolis and about 800 children and adults have gone through it since 2012, according to Fairview. (Beckstrom, 7/18)
California Health Report:
How Uniting Kids, Elders Helps Both
It’s a solution for two problems at once: children desperately need mentors to guide them, and isolated seniors yearn for more connection and meaning. The growing intergenerational activities movement received a powerful jolt last year when the Los Angeles-based Eisner Foundation sharpened its focus to solely support intergenerational programming. ... Eisner grant recipient Jumpstart for Young Children saturates 13 preschools with adult mentors over 55 in underserved LA neighborhoods — Compton, South LA, East LA and Echo Park. (Perry, 7/18)
