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In Johann Hari 's bestselling book, Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs , the British author explored misconceptions of addiction. It is not the drugs themselves that lead to dependence, he argued. Rather, it is one's environment and the attempt to self-medicate and alleviate pain that are the true causes of addiction. Three years later, Hari's follow up, Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression—and the Unexpected Solutions , digs beneath...

The Government Accountability Office did not mince words in the top line of a 1980 report to Congress on inequitable treatment of women in prison: “Women in correctional institutions are not provided comparable services, educational programs, or facilities as men prisoners.” Incarcerated women had been filing lawsuits—and they had been winning. Their conditions, they argued, violated their constitutional rights: Indifference to medical needs was cruel and unusual punishment, courts found .

Pastor Will Yancy, M.A. Ed., and Jackie Yancy, PhD , MSC/MFCT lead Triumph Educational Center in Oakland, California. Here they lead domestic violence abusers through the 52 week court mandated batterer intervention program. They also train others in the community to recognize and respond to domestic violence. Both Will and Jackie have a lot to say about how to motivate change, as well as effective strategies to create safe and thriving families.

"Meditation can lead people to some dark places, triggering trauma or leaving people feeling disoriented, according to Dr. Willoughby Britton, who has studied the adverse effects of contemplative practices for more than a decade. Now, she has teamed up with trauma specialist Dr. David Treleaven to help people work with these challenges. The First Do No Harm training program aims to make meditation safer, in part by recognizing its pitfalls."

GARY — Shenandoah Chefalo moved 50 times and went to 35 different schools by the age of 12. She was raised by a mom who was bipolar and addicted to cocaine and alcohol. At 13, Chefalo went into foster care. Somehow, she was able to escape the path of substance abuse, incarceration and unwanted pregnancies that many people with childhood trauma follow. So she's made it her mission to help others go in a similarly positive direction. [For more on this story by Giles Bruce, go to...

Jefferson City Public Schools is now screening most of its elementary students for mental health problems. Experts believe adverse childhood experiences can deeply affect the physical, social and emotional development of young children and those experiences can have effects much later in children's lives. Officials believe, with applications of interventions, the screenings will improve students' performance and increase the chances they'll be successful. The school system does the...

Health care professionals and social service providers understand that a person’s overall health is impacted more by what happens outside of the doctor’s office than by what happens during an annual visit. As YOW, a public health-focused initiative, convenes community partnerships and collaborators to formulate a plan to address the high rates of diabetes in Tillamook County, we are looking at root causes for type 2 diabetes and barriers to medical care for people who are pre-diabetic. That...

Has murder become the norm in our society? Every day, you turn on the new to see who else got killed. I had to disconnect my cable TV because I just got so sick and tired of watching homicide news every day and see no change in our country's policies. No kid is born to become a murderer. Yet, our society somehow does a great job turning them into monsters. How? Liberty and freedom for all! Oh, really? Then why is the U.S. incarceration rate one of the highest in the world? Why is our...

School safety, negligence documentation, and a need for a school reform My name is Natalia Garceau. For nine years, I’ve been working at a center similar to the one where Nikolas Cruz was sent to after his expulsion from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. You won’t hear anything from the teachers who work at such centers because they are afraid to lose their jobs and to be taken to court. They have families to feed. By contract, we are not allowed to speak with media about anything...

The research team of the Traumatic Stress Institute (TSI) of Klingberg Family Centers was honored to participate in SAMHSA’s recent national technical experts meeting titled Developing a Measurement Strategy and Metrics for Trauma-Informed Change in Behavioral and Health Settings. Dr. Steve Brown and Pat Wilcox from TSI and Dr. Courtney Baker from Tulane University attended the meeting. The gathering brought together experts and funders from across the US who are implementing and evaluating...

With much on their plates to do prior to taking off for the May 5-9 Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association (APA), Darcy Gruttadaro, Director of APA Foundation’s Center for Workplace Mental Health and Christopher Seeley, the Foundation’s Program Director for School and Justice Initiatives met up with mental health advocate (and my husband) Bill Emmet and me for lunch near the APA’s new office at the waterfront in southwest Washington, DC. Both Gruttadaro and Seeley are...

Want to prevent kids from using drugs and make it stick into young adulthood? Get the community involved and intervene before they're teens, say researchers from the University of Washington. A new, longitudinal study from the UW Social Development Research Group shows that young adults who grew up in communities that used a coordinated, science-based approach to prevention were more likely to have abstained from substance use, violence and other antisocial behaviors through age 21.