The directors of The American Mental Health Foundation mourn the loss of Eric J. Green, PhD, LPC-S, RPT-S: award-winning—in 2013, the Mary Smith Arnold Anti-oppression Award from the Counselors for Social Justice at the American Counseling Association Annual Convention, in honor of sustained efforts in advocacy for child-trauma survivors—Jungian play therapist; distinguished author; and, for […]
By: Evander LomkeAnnual Report of AMHF November 1, 2022, to October 31, 2023. As of November 1, 2023, The American Mental Health Foundation has done outstanding work for 100 years. This is the Eleventh Annual Report of The American Mental Health Foundation, an association formed in 1924, incorporated in New York State in 1954. AMHF celebrates eleven decades […]
By: Evander Lomke
Ours is a turbulent and challenging age with many major cultural shifts seemingly happening all at once. A few examples: world powers jockey for dominance, civil rights and other rights’ advocates compete to be heard, major social shifts occurred in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic with its many impacts isolating persons from each other, […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.Given the pressures in today’s world, would you welcome the opportunity to lessen your life stress and anxiety? Reduce your dysphoria and depression? Improve your physical health and sense of well-being? Even lengthen your life? What if I told you that you could attain all of these health benefits at no cost to your health-insurance […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.
As COVID-19 restrictions were lifted in 2022, people put aside masks, social distancing, and lockdown social isolation to venture out to restore a more normal life. Most found that the “old” normal had been altered during the lockdown and had been replaced by “new” normal, e.g., some employees now worked from home, some local small […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.Annual Report of AMHF November 1, 2021, to October 31, 2022; on November 1, 2022, The American Mental Health Foundation will be 99 years in existence thus rapidly moving into 100. Few not-for-profit organizations can make this claim. This is the Tenth Annual Report of The American Mental Health Foundation (AMHF), an organization formed in […]
By: Evander LomkeIt is happening everywhere. Adults are assaulted or shot in bars and entertainment venues. Teenagers and gang members kill each other in broad daylight. Children are murdered in their classrooms. Dinner guests who do not know each other break out in brawls in restaurants. Why is there this increase in crime and violence as COVID-19 […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.Raymond B. Flannery Jr., Ph.D., FACLP, a licensed clinical psychologist, is Adjunct Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School. He has also served on the faculties of Harvard Medical School and Boston College. For 10 years, he was Director of Training for the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health […]
By: Evander LomkeA busy pediatrician looked troubled and tense. He had seen this five-year old, Angela, once before two years ago. Then, it was a fall from some playground equipment her mother had said. Today, mom reported that it was a fractured wrist due to a fall from Angela’s bicycle. However this didn’t explain the child’s two […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.“Home is where the heart is” is a common expression that connotes caring and support. However in some homes it means heartache, medical injury, psychological terror, and even death. Not all family values are good, prosocial values; some are violent and destructive. Domestic violence (DV) refers to the physical, sexual, verbal/oral, and nonverbal acts of […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.
Twenty years ago I published a book (that link goes to the new edition, with additional information by scrolling down here) on a topic of national concern: preventing youth violence. The American Mental Health Foundation (AMHF) requested I write two blogs that highlighted the contents in the book. The first blog reviewed the early/serious/urgent warning […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.
Twenty years ago I published a book on a topic of national concern: preventing youth violence (Flannery, 2012a). The American Mental Health Foundation (AMHF), with its emphasis on improving mental-health awareness, requested I write two blogs (herewith, in 2019, are these two new essays) on some of the topics in the book. The first blog, from […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.Thanks to the research of television critic David Bianculli and his TV Worth Watching site, do “tune in” below (7 minutes) as tough-as-nails Rhode Island Senator John O. Pastore is won over by the compelling words of Fred Rogers (just days ago at this writing, the 50th anniversary of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, on what was […]
By: Evander Lomke
Dateline: February 14, 2018, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, Parkland, Florida. Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday had not coincided since the 1940s. The day began as an amalgam of frivolity and solemnity. It wound up a tragedy in Broward County. Violence in America. There’s an ongoing epidemic of Youth Violence. The American Mental Health Foundation […]
By: Evander Lomke
Violence: Why People Do Bad Things, with Strategies to Reduce that Risk by Raymond B. Flannery Jr., Ph.D., FAPM, June 2016 New England Psychologist Reviewed by Kerry Morrison, Psy.D. This new publication by Raymond Flannery called Violence: Why People Do Bad Things, with Strategies to Reduce that Risk, serves as a useful handbook for understanding the […]
By: Evander Lomke
On April 16, 2015, American Mental Health Foundation Books published its most comprehensive research project devoted to young people in its 90-plus-year history. Early Identification, Palliative Care, and Prevention of Psychotic Disorders in Children and Youth is the result of a pioneering two-year study developed and funded by AMHF. This monograph is also a collaborative […]
By: Evander Lomke
A year-and-a-half following the horrible killings at the Sandy Hook, Connecticut, elementary school, we Americans are still searching our souls, trying to understand how this tragedy could happen, why it did, what might have been the warning signs before young Adam Lanza snapped. Journalist Andrew Solomon met with Adam’s father, Peter Lanza, over six gut-wrenching […]
By: Evander Lomke
For several years the New York Times has devoted investigative reporting to the issue of abuse in group homes for the developmentally disabled in New York State. This can be an extremely sensitive topic for parents, who read a story like this and wonder how widespread the problem really is. The Times article implies that […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.
Today’s Washington Post offers yet another article on the effect of (often) well-meaning privacy laws when they are applied to potentially violent persons who are not following treatment guidelines or showing premonitory signs of becoming psychotic along with a chance of potential violence. Wide-ranging privacy laws came into effect under the Health Insurance Privacy and […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.
Dr. Joyce Brothers, who paved the way for television figures as diverse as Dr. Ruth K. Westheimer and Dr. Drew Pinsky, and was essential in making the mass-cultural discussion of deep-seated and uncomfortable emotions in the U.S. a more open forum, died yesterday. As my friend notes in the Los Angeles Times obituary—which quotes him […]
By: Evander Lomke
Here are some worthwhile books that can be ordered from the American Counseling Association (ANA): 1. Hays, D. G. (2013). Assessment in Counseling: A Guide to the Use of Psychological Assessment Procedures. Fifth Edition. This is a bestselling text, and the latest version includes updates and changes in assessment procedures. Test selection, interpretation of findings, […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.It seems we are reminded every day about posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It reveals itself in soldier suicides, which are occurring in a way that is more than we can bear. Shootings continue. In one city (Chicago), one mother has been so badly traumatized: She has lost four children over the years to street violence. […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.
This month governors and the President are reflecting on what is going on in their respective territories. I thought this would be a good time to look at the state of the state of mental health and to offer my own reflections. DSM V Will Be Issued This year will inaugurate the new DSM V. […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.Peggy Noonan, writing in the Wall Street Journal, suggests that we listen to Eugene Kennedy, who spoke about the Newtown tragedy in a much different manner from other commentators: He does not believe that the many “solutions” bandied about will make children (or ourselves) safer. Rather, it is time for us to reflect on this […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.On December 20, 2012, the American Psychiatric Association sent the following letter to Congressional leaders in Washington: To:
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.
For at least several weeks we have been hearing about and seeing the bullying incident that occurred in upstate New York near Rochester. This occurred on a school bus where at least several students mercilessly taunted a 68-year-wiman who was riding the bus as a bus monitor. The video of this occurring captivated worldwide attention—especially […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.
Part 1 of this essay examined the general nature of violence in the workplace. It noted the major types of crimes in the workplace, the various types of patient assailants, the theories that seek to explain such violent behavior, and the various physical and psychological impacts such violence has on staff victims. Part 2 examines […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.Suicide rates are unacceptably high. A U.S. soldier, present or recent past, is said to kill himself or herself every eighty minutes. In countries suffering economic crises, the situation is in some ways even more tragic. Reuters reports that “behind every suicide in crisis-stricken countries such as Greece there are up to 20 more people […]
By: Evander LomkeThe alarm clock goes off. You are up and about and, in time, you make your way to work. As you enter your worksite, you think: another routine day at work. But what if it were not a routine day? What if today you became a victim of violence in the workplace? It could happen […]
By: Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr.
When I worked in the Astor Day Treatment Program many years ago, our program shared a large inner-city school building with a Head Start Program. It was heartwarming to see young children learning the skills and developing the kinds of relationships that would lead to later success in life. Many didn’t get proper nutrition and […]
By: William Van Ornum, Ph.D.
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