HealthDay (3/23, Preidt) reported, “Seniors who are hospitalized for pneumonia are at high risk for long-term physical and mental problems that can impair their ability to care for themselves,” according to a study published online March 15 in the American Journal of Medicine. “The study looked at data on about 1,400 adults older than 50 who survived more than 1,700 hospitalizations for pneumonia, heart attack or stroke.” Notably, “the effects of pneumonia were comparable to those seen in people who survive a heart attack or stroke, the researchers said.”

Related Links:

— “Pneumonia May Lead to Serious Aftereffects for Seniors, “Robert Preidt, HealthDay, March 22, 2013.

Palm Beach (FL) Post (3/24, Isger) reported, “In January, President Barack Obama proposed a goal of reaching 750,000 young people to identify mental illness early. The plan includes $15 million to train teachers and other adults and to detect mental illness and another $40 million to schools and other agencies to connect those families with help, but doesn’t detail how.” The Post added, “School settings would have the broadest reach, said Dr. Paul Appelbaum, past president of the American Psychiatric Association, who participated in the meetings that led to Obama’s proposal.” Dr. Appelbaum explained, “Many kids don’t come in regularly to doctor or primary care physicians sometimes because their families can’t afford it or because they’re healthy.”

Scully Expresses APA’s Support For Senate Student Mental Health Bill.Psychiatric News (3/23) reported, “US Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) has introduced a bill to provide support for teachers to learn about the key warning signs of mental health problems in students as well as the impact that mental health conditions can have on a student’s ability to learn and behave in the classroom. The Helping Educators Support All Students Act would create a four-year discretionary grant for state education agencies to provide training for teachers and other school staff in recognizing mental health issues.” In a letter [pdf] to Sen. Klobuchar, American Psychiatric Association “medical director and CEO James H. Scully Jr., MD, expressed APA’s support for the bill, saying the initiative ‘paves the way for highly successful and evidence-based training initiatives…to empower more of these professionals with the knowledge of mental illness, the ability to detect warning signs, and the ability to take appropriate action in linking adolescents to the services they need.'”

Related Links:

— “How would mental-health screening for kids at school work?, ” Sonja Isger, The Palm Beach Post, March 24, 2013.

USA Today (3/24, Bakeman) reported, “Psychiatrists, county officials and law enforcement are questioning a portion of New York’s new gun-control law that requires them to take steps that could lead to guns being seized from potentially dangerous people.” Since earlier this month, “New York’s Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act has required mental health professionals to report when a patient is a potential danger to himself or others.” According to USA Today, “therapists’ chief concern is that patients feeling suicidal or homicidal might conceal their troubles to avoid having their guns removed.”

Related Links:

— “Mental-health officials clash on N.Y. gun law reporting, “Jessica Bakeman, USA Today, March 24, 2013.

In an opinion piece in the Baltimore Sun (3/17), Steven S. Sharfstein, MD, president and CEO of Sheppard Pratt Health System in Baltimore, MD and a past president of the American Psychiatric Association, wrote, “In the intense debate on gun violence and mental illness, with a focus on the extremely rare event of mass murders such as in Newtown, Conn., or Aurora, Colo., what is lost in the conversation and debate is the serious suicide epidemic we experience in the United States every year due to gun violence.” Dr. Sharfstein pointed out, “Of 30,000 gun deaths in the US every year, nearly 20,000 are suicides.” Dr. Sharfstein concluded, “Barriers to purchasing a gun for those with a history of treatment for mental illness will likely have a positive impact on the suicide rate, but not much effect on the homicide rate.”

Related Links:

— “Mental illness and guns: the issue is suicide, “Steven S. Sharfstein, The Baltimore Sun, March 17, 2013.

The Los Angeles Times (3/20, Levey) reports that a new survey from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that three years after President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act, the law “remains largely a mystery to most Americans.” Nearly “six in 10 Americans say they still don’t have enough information to understand how the Affordable Care Act will affect them. Ignorance about the law is even higher among Americans who stand to benefit most, with more than two-thirds of people without health insurance reporting they don’t have enough information.”

Related Links:

— “Ignorance about health law remains high, “Noam N. Levey, Los Angeles Times, March 20, 2013.

The New York Times (3/21, A17, Hoffman, Subscription Publication) reports, “The likelihood of a school-aged American child receiving a diagnosis of autism, Asperger syndrome or a related developmental disorder increased 72 percent in 2011-12 from 2007, according to an analysis of a phone survey of parents released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Health Resources and Services Administration.” The new “report emphasized that while the numbers changed from one in 86 children, ages six to 17, having received a diagnosis in a 2007 parent survey, to one in 50 children in the current report, most of the increase was because of previously undiagnosed cases.”

Related Links:

— “Parental Study Shows Rise in Autism Spectrum Cases, “Jan Hoffman, The New York Times, March 20, 2013.

The Boston Herald (3/21, McConville) reports, “Abused girls who go on to become mothers are three times more likely than their non-abused peers to have” a child with autism, according to a study published online March 20 in JAMA Psychiatry.

The CNN (3/21, Sloane) “The Chart” blog reports, “Investigators at the Harvard School of Public Health looked at more than 50,000 women in the Nurses’ Health Study II group, and found that those who reported the highest levels of abuse as children themselves were 60% more likely to have children with some type of autism-spectrum disorder.” However, “the reasons for the apparent connection…remain murky.”

Related Links:

— “Study: Abuse victims more likely to have autistic children, “Christine McConville, Boston Herald, March 20, 2013.

HealthDay (3/22, Preidt) reports, “Despite beliefs to the contrary, overweight people with a serious mental illness are able to make the lifestyle changes necessary to lose weight,” according to a study simultaneously published online March 21 in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented at the American Heart Association meeting. “The study included 291 overweight or obese patients with a serious mental illness, including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or major depression.” Researchers enrolled 144 patients “in a program that provided them with simple nutrition advice, counseling and regular exercise classes.” The remaining 147 patients received no guidance for weight loss and served as the control group.

Related Links:

— “Mental Illness May Not Impede Healthy Weight Loss, Study Says, “Robert Preidt, HealthDay, March 21, 2013.

CQ (3/22, Norman, Subscription Publication) reports that with the increasing suicide rates among members of the military drawing concern, “an expert on mental health told a House subcommittee on Thursday that there are many similarities between young adult civilians and members of the armed forces who take their own lives.” Jerry Reed, “director of the National Suicide Prevention Resource Center, said suicide is a broad societal problem among young adults in the United States – not just members of the armed forces.”

HealthDay (3/22, Preidt) reports, “Media coverage of mass shootings by people with mental illnesses may heighten the stigma that already surrounds people struggling with mental disorders,” according to the results of “an online survey of nearly 1,800 American adults” appearing in the April issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry, a publication of the American Psychiatric Association. The survey “also found that public support for policies to reduce gun violence rises after news coverage of mass shootings. Specifically, people who read a news story describing a mass shooting were more likely than those who did not read such an article to support gun restrictions for people with serious mental illness, and for a ban on large-capacity ammunition magazines,” the survey found.

Sharfstein: Gun Laws Could Have Major Impact On US Suicide Rate. Psychiatric News (3/22) reports that former American Psychiatric Association president Steven Sharfstein, MD, in a piece that appeared earlier this week in the Baltimore Sun, emphasized that “while laws aimed at keeping guns out of the hands of people with mental illness, which are being debated in Maryland, would have little effect on the homicide rate in the United States, they could have a major impact on the suicide rate.” Dr. Sharfstein “pointed out that 20,000 of the 30,000 annual gun-related deaths in this country are suicides.” According to Dr. Sharfstein, “to bring down the gun suicide rate, strong barriers to availability of guns are needed.”

Related Links:

— “News Coverage of Shootings May Boost Stigma of Mental Illness, “Robert Preidt, HealthDay, March 21, 2013.