Medscape (5/18, Anderson) reports that at the American Psychiatric Association’s annual meeting, former Democratic Rhode Island congressman Patrick Kennedy, “who helped spearhead the national battle to end discrimination against mental illness,” called for more advocacy to ensure enforcement of the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act that was passed in 2008. Kennedy “said, ‘We have the promise of parity, but in order to make it a reality, we really need to put together a political movement.’” Kennedy then “urged the audience to ‘take on this issue from a place of personal commitment.’”

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— Medscape (requires login and subscription)

HealthDay (5/17, Norton) reports on new research from the Center for Vital Longevity at the University of Texas at Dallas that shows that “busyness” among older adults may improve memory, information processing and reasoning. A study of 330 men and women between the ages of 50 and 89 showed that the people who were “busier” – those who stated that they often had too many things to do each day to complete – tested better in memory, information processing speed, reasoning, and vocabulary.

Medical Daily (5/17, Borreli) also reports on the study, which evaluates the benefits of a “healthy” busy schedule on mental health. The study, published in the journal Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, required participants to rank their “busyness” according to standards from the Martin and Park Environmental Demands Questionnaire (MPED). However, lead author Sara Festini said that although the study showed better cognitive performance associated with busier schedules, findings “do not mean being busy directly improves cognition” and that “it’s possible people with better cognitive function seek out a busier lifestyle, or that busyness and cognition reinforce and strengthen each other.”

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— “Keep Busy! Stay Sharp!,” Amy Norton, HealthDay, May 17, 2016.

Medscape (5/17, Brooks) reports, “A rigorous programmatic approach to suicide prevention led by Magellan Health Services, in Arizona, that involves the local behavioral health community, is achieving promising results,” research presented at the American Psychiatric Association’s annual meeting suggests. In fact, during “the first 90 days of implementation, there were no reported suicides in the” Maricopa County Medicaid “behavioral health population in Arizona.” In addition, the so-called “Magellan Driving Suicide to Zero Initiative…decreased the suicide rate (number of suicides per 100,000) by 67% for the population and by 42% in people with serious mental illness.”

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— Medscape (requires login and subscription)

The Wall Street Journal (5/17, Radnofsky, Subscription Publication) reports that according to the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, some 9.1% of Americans, or 28.6 million people, were uninsured in 2015. That figure was 16 percent in 2010, when President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law. Commenting on the data, HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell said 2015 was “the first year in our nation’s history that fewer than 1 in 10 Americans lacked health insurance, and the report documents the progress we’ve made expanding coverage across the country.”

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— “Number of Uninsured in U.S. Dropped Below 10% for First Time in 2015,” Louise Radnofsky, Wall Street Journal, May 17, 2016. [Subscription Needed]

Medscape (5/16, Cassels) reports that even though the “two thirds” of “Americans believe that untreated mental illness has a significant negative impact on the US economy and that there is a strong need for mental health care reform, only 5% believe that mental health problems are a priority for Congress,” the findings of a “new national poll” conducted by the American Psychiatric Association suggest. The findings of the poll were released at APA’s annual meeting. Commenting on the poll’s findings, APA president Renée Binder, MD, said in a news release, “We applaud the lawmakers in Congress who recognize the dire need to improve our nation’s mental health system. But we call upon Congress as a whole to embrace this issue.”

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— Medscape (requires login and subscription)