MFP/ANA e-Newsletter: October 17, 2025

MENTAL HEALTH, SUBSTANCE USE, AND NURSING ARTICLES

World Mental Health Day 2025 (opens new window)

Every year on 10 October, World Mental Health Day provides an opportunity for people working on mental health issues to talk about their work and mobilize support to make mental health care a reality for people worldwide, since mental health is a basic human right. This year’s theme is “Providing mental health support and services during times of disaster and crisis”. When disasters strike, they can aggravate mental health conditions, particularly when people are displaced, experience loss and have scarce resources. Everyone has a unique experience to a disaster, and some may develop mental health conditions as a result of emergencies which can be long-term. There is a higher incidence of psychological difficulties among children and adolescents. Read more (opens new window) 

Bellingham on World Mental Health Day: Okay to be vulnerable (opens new window)

Jude Bellingham has opened up on feeling vulnerable in an interview to mark World Mental Health Day. The Real Madrid and England midfielder revealed he used to search his name on social media as a young player at Birmingham but has learned to brush off criticism from outside. Speaking as a Laureus Ambassador, Bellingham said: "With the development of social media and technology, there's more ways to attack someone, to make them feel down -- and I think there's still a stigma around talking about mental health. "I know there's been times where I've felt vulnerable, doubted myself and needed someone to talk to -- and, instead, I've tried to keep up this macho athlete image of, 'I don't need anyone'. Read more (opens new window)

In Kenya, a search for links between a changing climate and mental health (opens new window)

The daily grind of putting food on the table is stressful for people the world over, especially for women, who still provide the bulk of that work. A changing climate adds to the anxiety. Kaloleni in Kilifi County is one of Kenya ’s poorest areas. Women carry buckets of water for miles through the dusty landscape. Homes are mostly built of mud and have no indoor plumbing. Maize plants wither in the heat. “These communities are struggling to grow their crops and have to spend money on food,” said Zul Merali from The Aga Khan University, who has set up a local institute for mental and brain health. “This creates a lot of pressure, particularly on women, because they are in charge of making sure that kids and families are fed." Read more (opens new window)

Beyond the hunger and the conflict - Gaza’s growing mental health crisis (opens new window)

As we watch the heart-breaking scenes from Gaza—families constantly fleeing and searching for safety, children crying, homes and hospitals destroyed, no proper health care, and no food—I think about the people and the terrible things they have to endure. I wonder how it’s even possible to survive—not just physically, but mentally. Conflict brings more than violence. It brings hunger, fear, and deep uncertainty. When people don’t know where their next meal will come from, or whether their home will still be standing tomorrow, the stress becomes overwhelming. Read more (opens new window)  (opens new window)

World Mental Health Day 2025: How nutrition can boost your mental well-being (opens new window)

On World Mental Health Day, remember that good nutrition fuels not just your body but also your mind. What you eat can affect your mood, energy level, and overall mental health. This is how easy dietary choices can help you stay happy and balanced. World Mental Health Day is a good time to remember that mental well-being is as important as physical health. Stress management, therapy and exercise are important – but nutrition is too often left out of the picture when it comes to how you feel emotionally. The brain is a very metabolically demanding organ that needs nutrients to function optimally. What we eat has a powerful effect on neurotransmitter creation, gut health and energy metabolism — all of which directly influence how we feel and think. Read more (opens new window) 

Duke secures $15M grant to advance AI tool predicting adolescent mental illness (opens new window)

A team at Duke University has secured a $15 million federal grant to expand an artificial intelligence model designed to predict mental illness in adolescents. The Duke Predictive Model of Adolescent Mental Health (Duke-PMA), co-developed by Professor of Psychiatry Jonathan Posner, Assistant Professor of Biostatistics & Bioinformatics Matthew Engelhard and AI Health Fellow Elliot Hill, is an AI-based tool that assesses factors related to adolescent mental health. The model is used to predict who is most likely to develop a mental illness within a year. It also identifies the key factors driving those predictions, offering the potential to guide targeted preventive interventions. Read more (opens new window)

Women carry a higher genetic risk of depression, new study says (opens new window)

Women carry a higher genetic risk of depression, a new study has found. Claiming to be the largest genetic study to date on sex differences in major depression, the research published on Wednesday in Nature Communications has found 16 genetic variants linked to depression in women and eight in men. The study, led by Australia’s QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, showed a large proportion of the variants associated with depression were shared between sexes, but there was a “higher burden of genetic risk in females which could be due to female-specific variants”. Read more (opens new window)

Brief Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Suicidal Military Personnel and Veterans (opens new window)

US military personnel and veterans have higher rates of suicide than the general population. Previous trials support the efficacy of brief cognitive behavioral therapy (BCBT) for reducing suicide attempts among military personnel compared with treatment as usual, and replication of these findings is needed. Read more (opens new window)  (opens new window)

Opening doors or building cages? The adverse consequences of psychiatric diagnostic labels (opens new window)

Psychiatric diagnostic labels can no longer be considered mere neutral descriptors for mental distress; the weight of evidence indicates that they shape reality, often in problematic ways. Providing accurate information about the scientific status of diagnostic labels helps minimize many of these problems. Academic psychiatry and psychology must therefore learn to resist the temptation to reduce human complexity to fixed labels, provide accurate information when labels are applied, consider to separate diagnoses from experienced distress, recognize patients’ experiences as legitimate perspectives, and, most importantly, develop the conceptual competence to design and integrate alternative human-centered approaches that go beyond diagnosis-centric practices. Read more (opens new window)  (opens new window)

Study Renews Warning on Antidepressant, Painkiller Combo (opens new window)

Combining the commonly used painkiller tramadol with certain antidepressants may increase seizure risk for elderly patients, a cohort study suggested. From a sample of over 70,000 nursing home residents, those who initiated a CYP2D6-inhibiting antidepressant on existing tramadol use had a 9% higher seizure risk than than those taking tramadol with CYP2D6-neutral antidepressants (adjusted incidence rate ratio [aIRR] 1.09, 95% CI 1.02-1.18), Yu-Jung Jenny Wei, PhD, of the Ohio State University in Columbus, and colleagues reported in Neurology. Also, seizure risk was 6% higher among those who added tramadol onto an existing CYP2D6-inhibiting antidepressant (aIRR 1.06, 95% CI 1.03-1.10, P<0.001). Read more (opens new window)  (opens new window)

Cannabis Use Increasing in People With Psychosis (opens new window)

Cannabis use increased among people with psychosis after states legalized the substance for recreational use, according to a longitudinal cohort study. In states where recreational cannabis was legalized, 30-day cannabis use increased by 9.53 percentage points (95% CI 3.05-16.00, P=0.004) among people with psychosis, reported Andrew S. Hyatt, MD, of Harvard Medical School in Boston, and co-authors in JAMA Psychiatry. That increase was well above the 3.3-percentage point increase in past-month cannabis use among the general population observed in a recent study. Read more (opens new window)  (opens new window)

California's Nursing Shortage Is Getting Worse. Frontline Workers Blame Management. (opens new window)

California, like much of the nation, is not producing enough nurses working at bedsides to meet the needs of an aging and diverse population, fueling a workforce crunch that risks endangering quality patient care. Nearly 60% of California counties, stretching between the borders with Mexico and Oregon, face a nursing shortage, according to state data. Read more (opens new window)

HOTLINE RESOURCES

988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (opens new window) or 1-800-273-TALK (8255) 

The Substance and Mental Health Services Administration (opens new window) provides COVID-19 guidance and resources to assist individuals, providers, communities and sates across the country. The website is updated daily.

The National CLAS Standards

The National CLAS Standards are a set of 15 action steps intended to advance health equity, improve quality, and help eliminate health care disparities by providing a blueprint for individuals and health and health care organizations to implement culturally and linguistically appropriate services. View the standards here (opens new window)