Use of meds by L.A. County foster, delinquent kids prompts reform, By Garrett Therolf, April 7, 2015, Los Angeles Times: “Los Angeles County officials are preparing to crack down on doctors who inappropriately prescribe powerful psychiatric drugs to foster youth and children in the juvenile delinquency system, according to a copy of the plans obtained by The Times. Social workers and child welfare advocates have long alleged that the widespread use of the drugs is fueled in part by some caretakers’ desire to make the children in their care more docile. On May 1, the county Department of Mental Health is scheduled to launch a program to use computer programs to identify doctors who have a pattern of overprescribing the medications or prescribing unsafe combinations of the drugs…”
Tag: Mental health
Medicaid Expansion and Mental Health Treatment
Medicaid expansion would have helped 18,400 mentally ill Louisianians in 2014, study says, By Rebecca Catalanello, New Orleans Times-Picayune: “More than 18,400 uninsured Louisianians diagnosed with mental health conditions were denied access to affordable mental health treatment last year — care that would have been available to them if the state’s leaders expanded Medicaid as allowed by federal law, a new study shows. The American Mental Health Counselors Association examined the impact of Medicaid expansion on the mentally ill in the United States and found that more than a half-million uninsured adults were diagnosed with a serious mental health at the beginning of 2014, but did not get treated because they lived in the 24 states that did not expand Medicaid as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act allows…”
Unemployment and Mental Health
For younger adults, unemployment may triple the risk of depression, By Karen Kaplan, March 19, 2015, Los Angeles Times: “Unemployment isn’t just bad for your bank account. It can also do serious damage to mental health – especially for younger adults who are just starting out in life, new research shows. Nearly 12% of Americans between ages 18 and 25 were deemed to be depressed based on their answers to eight questions that were part of a survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health departments. But within this age group, those who were unemployed were 3.17 times more likely to be depressed than their counterparts with jobs…”