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Latest News Around the Web

Music Festival Focuses On Mental Health In The Music Industry

PBS NewsHour (9/19, Brown) reported, “The music industry, full of glamorous stars and thrilling performances, can also be grueling for the musicians themselves, sometimes even with tragic consequences.” A MusiCares survey from 2024 “revealed that over 8 percent of respondents within that industry had…serious thoughts of suicide in the past year. That is notably higher than the 5 percent rate among the general population.” Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown discussed the Park City Song Summit in Utah that featured an emphasis on mental health and wellness.

Related Links:

— “Music festival helps artists confront and manage the industry’s mental health impact,”William Brangham, PBS NewsHour , September 19, 2025

Pre-COVID-19 Health-Related Quality Of Life Tied To Symptom Severity In Patients With Long COVID, Study Finds

Infectious Disease Advisor (9/19, Kuhns) reported a study found that “pre-COVID-19 mental and physical health is significantly worse in patients who later develop long COVID.” For the study, researchers “aimed to determine whether health-related quality of life (HRQOL) prior to COVID-19 infection predicts development of long COVID symptoms. They also compared pre-COVID-19 HRQOL between patients who developed long COVID and matched control patients, as well as HRQOL trajectories from initial infection through 1 year.” Researchers observed that “lower pre-COVID-19 HRQOL scores were significantly associated with a higher risk for multiple long COVID symptoms, including after adjustments for age, sex, and initial COVID-19 hospitalization.” Furthermore, “after 1 year of follow-up, the researchers noted both mental and physical health scores remained significantly lower in patients with long COVID compared with matched control patients. Although patients with long COVID experienced a greater decline in HRQOL 1 year after initial infection, the decline was not clinically significant.” The study was published in Frontiers in Public Health.

Related Links:

— “Pre-COVID-19 HRQOL Predicts Severity of Long COVID Symptoms,”Lisa Kuhns, Infectious Disease Advisor , September 19, 2025

Repetitive Head Injuries From Soccer Headers Associated With Increased Microstructural Disruption, Reduced Cognitive Performance, Study Finds

Healio (9/18, Gawel) reports a study found that “soccer players with more frequent repetitive head injuries from heading the ball had significantly greater microstructural disruption in their juxtacortical white matter at sulci depths.” Subsequently, “these injuries also were associated with poorer performance on verbal learning and memory performance testing.” Study lead Michael L. Lipton, MD, PhD, professor of radiology, Columbia University Irving Medical Center, told Healio, “The study builds on our prior work showing that heading is associated with changes in brain microstructure and cognitive performance.” He added, “However, the peripheral white matter has never been examined, although it is known to be a site of injury in TBI and a focus of pathology in CTE.” The study was published in Neurology.

Related Links:

— “Soccer heading linked to microstructural injury, lower cognitive performance,”Richard Gawel, Healio , September 18, 2025

State, Federal Healthcare Cuts Weaken Homegrown Physician Pipeline In Rural Communities

KFF Health News (9/18, Wolfson) reports the goal of fostering physicians who train locally and stay to work in rural areas is weakened by “recent state and federal spending cuts” that will “pull dollars out of an already frayed health system, exacerbating the shortage of care and making their efforts more challenging.” KFF details how “California’s health care shortage is driven by the struggles of rural hospitals; an aging physician workforce; the inherent appeal to up-and-coming doctors of more urban areas; and the financial pressures of doing business in a region with a high proportion of low-paying government insurance, especially Medi-Cal, the state’s version of the Medicaid program, for people with low incomes and disabilities.” Specialists are in “acutely short supply” in many northern counties, with some areas with no specialists at all. Beyond funding cuts, “medical educators also worry about new caps on federal student loans, which could deter lower-income students, including those in rural areas, from medical school. Altogether, the financial constraints will only make the health care shortage worse.”

Related Links:

— “Health Care Cuts Threaten Homegrown Solutions to Rural Doctor Shortages,”Bernard J. Wolfson, KFF Health News, September 18, 2025

Patients With Atopic Eczema Have Increased Suicidal Ideation Risk, Study Suggests

HealthDay (9/17, Gotkine) reports a study presented at the 2025 European Academy of Dermatology and Venereology (EADV) Congress suggests that “patients with atopic eczema (AE) have an increased risk for suicidal ideation (SI).” The researchers “surveyed 15,223 adults with AE and 7,968 controls without eczema across 27 countries to examine the prevalence of SI and its associated risk factors in the Scars of Life study.” They observed that “SI was reported by 13.2 percent of AE patients compared with 8.5 percent of controls. No significant difference was seen in the prevalence of SI across AE subgroups, but all had elevated odds of SI versus controls. Key predictors were revealed on comparison of 2,010 SI cases with 13,213 non-SI cases, including younger age and obesity.” Meanwhile, clinical risk factors “included moderate-to-severe AE, pruritus, skin pain, and high symptom intensity.”

Related Links:

— “Suicidal Ideation Risk Elevated for Patients With Atopic Eczema,”Elana Gotkine, HealthDay, September 17, 2025

Foundation News

Schuster to Receive Anti-Stigma Advocacy Award

Janice Lynch Schuster will be awarded the 2020 Maryland Foundation for Psychiatry (MFP) Anti-Stigma Advocacy Prize for her op-ed, “People are not defined by their diseases” in the October 14, 2019 Baltimore Sun. The MFP Board unanimously felt that her article very effectively portrayed not only how hurtful stigma can be, but that health care providers themselves may be the culprits thoughtlessly participating in stigmatizing people – particularly when people are abusing drugs. Her statement inspires others to seek and give help, and to reframe substance abuse as a disease that must be treated scientifically and empathically.

The Anti-Stigma Advocacy Award, which carries a $500 prize, will be formally presented at the Maryland Psychiatric Society annual meeting on October 8.

The Foundation established this annual prize for a worthy piece published in a major newspaper (preferably local or regional) that accomplishes one or more of the following:
Shares with the public their experience with mental illness in themselves, a family
member, or simply in the community.
Helps others to overcome their inability to talk about mental illness or their own mental
illness.
Imparts particularly insightful observations on the general subject of mental illness.

Click here for information about past winners.

New Radio Ad Explores Racial Inequities and Mental Health in Current Crises

Institutional and structural racism are major factors in these times of pandemic and civil unrest. The African American community is particularly hit hard by the coronavirus, police brutality, and the economic burdens that come with them. The ad explains how there is hope and help available.

Racial Inequities and Current Crises in AmericaRacial Inequities and Current Crises in America, MP3, 712KB

You can listen to the ad using the player in the upper right of the website’s homepage. All past public service spots are also available for listening or to download on our Radio Advertisements page.

The Foundation Strongly Condemns All Forms of Racism

A Message from the Maryland Foundation for Psychiatry Board of Directors:

The Maryland Foundation for Psychiatry strongly condemns all forms of racism.  The Foundation calls on all Americans and all levels of government to actively oppose racism, and all related violence and brutality. The Foundation recognizes that there are wide disparities in treatment of mental illness and access to care related to race. Consistent with our mission to fight stigma associated with mental illness and to promote awareness and access to care for all individuals regardless of race, the Foundation pledges to support programs which combat racism.

The Maryland Foundation for Psychiatry stands in solidarity with the agendas of the American Psychiatric Association, Maryland Psychiatric Society, and the Black Psychiatrists of America.  We endorse the following action items outlined by the Black Psychiatrists of America:

• Declare racism a public health problem and establish national goals for addressing this as a health equity issue. Give priority to addressing the issues of health care disparities including the mental health needs of historically marginalized communities across the US.
 
• Provide adequate funding for the clinical care, training, and research needed to eliminate health disparities and require racism impact statements for all government funded services and research. 
 
• Establish a governmental multidisciplinary and ethnically diverse commission with representatives from the major health care professional associations in medicine, nursing, psychiatry, public health, psychology, social work, etc., and the faith-based community to provide recommendations to Congress regarding policies on how best to improve the health and well-being of our nation’s Black citizens.
 
• Declare “Civic Mental Health” a national priority and incorporate it into the educational curriculum from K-college, as well as in the training of local, state and national officials, law enforcement, and the criminal justice system. 
 
• Establish police community review boards with power to take action in areas of police misconduct pending formal review by the appropriate authorities. This will offer a level of empowerment when communities feel they have a voice that can be heard. 
 
• Assure adequate insurance coverage for mental disorders and emotional distress that are the outgrowth of racism, police brutality, discrimination of all kinds and violence. 

The Maryland Psychiatric Society has also put out a statement on their website.

The American Psychiatric Association (APA) also condemns racism and has published their statement, too.

New Radio Ad Explores Mental Health in the Wake of the Coronavirus

A recent poll shows that more than half the people in the United States are feeling extremely worried by the coronavirus. They find they aren’t sleeping properly, are distracted, or being driven into depression. The ad explains how there is hope and help available.

The Coronavirus and Your State of MindThe Coronavirus and Your State of Mind, MP3, 721KB

You can listen to the ad using the player in the upper right of the website’s homepage. All past public service spots are also available for listening or to download on our Radio Advertisements page.