Author: ANews

New survey shows over 3 in 10 adolescents are receiving mental health treatment

Uncategorized

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, roughly 8.3 million children between the ages of 12 and 17 reported receiving mental health treatment last year, an increase of 500,000 from 2022.

Meanwhile, an additional 60 million adults aged 18 or older also utilized medication, counseling or other forms of treatment to address their mental health in 2023, an increase of 3.4 million from a year prior.

RELATED STORY | 75% of Americans feel health care system handles mental health worse than physical, poll finds

Those findings are according to SAMHSA’s Annual National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which is used by mental health and addiction experts across the country to closely track changes in the general well-being of Americans.

Dr. Miriam E. Delphin-Rittmon is the Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Mental Health and Substance Use. While the data showed that mental health is a growing concern in the U.S., she said the report is actually a positive sign because it means more people with mental health problems are reaching out and getting help.

“Each year, data from the annual NSDUH provides an opportunity to identify and address unmet healthcare needs across America,” Delphin-Rittmon said in a statement. “We’re pleased to see that more people received mental health treatment in 2023 than the previous year.”

MENTAL HEALTH RESOURCES

988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline

Call or text 988 or chat 988lifeline.org. The 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is a national network of local crisis centers that provide free and confidential emotional support to people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Crisis Text Line

Text MHA to 741741 and you’ll be connected to a Mental Health America trained Crisis Counselor. Other hotline resources are available here. You can also find support groups through your local MHA affiliate who can assist.

Interactive Resources

New survey shows over 3 in 10 adolescents are receiving mental health treatment

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, roughly 8.3 million children between the ages of 12 and 17 reported receiving mental health treatment last year, an increase of 500,000 from 2022.

Meanwhile, an additional 60 million adults aged 18 or older also utilized medication, counseling or other forms of treatment to address their mental health in 2023, an increase of 3.4 million from a year prior.

RELATED STORY | 75% of Americans feel health care system handles mental health worse than physical, poll finds

Those findings are according to SAMHSA’s Annual National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which is used by mental health and addiction experts across the country to closely track changes in the general well-being of Americans.

Dr. Miriam E. Delphin-Rittmon is the Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for Mental Health and Substance Use. While the data showed that mental health is a growing concern in the U.S., she said the report is actually a positive sign because it means more people with mental health problems are reaching out and getting help.

“Each year, data from the annual NSDUH provides an opportunity to identify and address unmet healthcare needs across America,” Delphin-Rittmon said in a statement. “We’re pleased to see that more people received mental health treatment in 2023 than the previous year.”

MENTAL HEALTH RESOURCES

988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline

Call or text 988 or chat 988lifeline.org. The 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is a national network of local crisis centers that provide free and confidential emotional support to people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Crisis Text Line

Text MHA to 741741 and you’ll be connected to a Mental Health America trained Crisis Counselor. Other hotline resources are available here. You can also find support groups through your local MHA affiliate who can assist.

Interactive Resources

Read More

Replacing red meat cuts dementia risk by 20%, study says

Uncategorized

The risk for dementia dropped by 20%, however, for people who replaced that small daily serving of processed red meat with a daily serving of nuts and legumes.

Processed red meats such as bacon, sausage, hot dogs and deli meats often contain higher levels of sodium, nitrates and saturated fat. Eating higher amounts of these meats has been strongly linked to the development of colon and other cancers, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease and stroke, studies have shown.

“There is much we can do to reduce the risks of dementia, starting with actions that are well known to reduce risks of cardiovascular disease,” said Dr. Walter Willett, professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston.

“There are still aspects of this to understand in more detail,” Willett said in an email. “For example it seems that some foods may be particularly important to include and we would like to understand the specific active ingredients, but we don’t need to wait for all the details to take action.”

The study was observational and can only show an association and not necessarily cause and effect, said Dr. David Katz, a specialist in preventive and lifestyle medicine who was not involved in the study.

“However, the associations are very likely to be causal, because the principal risk factors for Alzheimer’s and cognitive decline are the risk factors for cardiovascular disease, with which processed meat intake is strongly linked,” he said in an email. Katz is the founder of the nonprofit True Health Initiative, a global coalition of experts dedicated to evidence-based lifestyle medicine.

Each additional serving of processed red meat raised risk

An abstract of the study, which is under review for publication, was presented Wednesday at the 2024 Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in Philadelphia.

Every two to four years for over three decades, researchers captured dietary data from more than 130,000 participants in the Nurses’ Health Study, one of the largest investigations into the risk factors for major chronic diseases in women, and the complimentary Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, which investigated the same risk factors in men.

The men and women were asked how often they ate a serving of processed red meat, which could be two slices of bacon, one hot dog, two small links of sausage or kielbasa, and salami, bologna or other processed meat sandwiches.

The study participants were also asked how often they ate nuts and legumes, such as 1 tablespoon of peanut butter; 1 ounce of peanuts, walnuts or other nuts; an 8-ounce glass of soy milk; a half cup of string beans, lentils, beans, peas or lima beans; or a typical 3-ounce serving of tofu or soy protein.

“Those are anti-inflammatory foods, so you can imagine they have a lot of benefits in addition to reducing the processed meats with toxins, nitrates and sodium which are not good for you,” said Dr. Maria Carrillo, chief science officer of the Alzheimer’s Association, who was not involved in the study.

Read More