Mental Health & Aging Project

2009 Michigan Mental Health & Aging Conference

More than 350 individuals attended the Sixth Annual Michigan Mental Health & Aging Conference (MHAC) on May 5-6, 2009 at the Kellogg Center on the Michigan State campus in East Lansing. Formerly called the OBRA Conference, MHAC is in its 21^st year of providing high quality training and continuing education opportunities for professionals who work with older adults across the state. The Michigan Department of Community Health sponsors the conference, which is developed and presented by the Mental Health and Aging Project. The conference featured 23 intensive sessions, workshops, and keynote presentations on a variety of topics, including personality disorders, depression, psychosis, aphasia, culture change in long-term care, psychoactive medications, hoarding, legal issues, culture and race, and pain management.  
Each year, MHAP staff compiles a book of the handouts provided in each session. This book or individual workshop handouts may be borrowed through the MHAP Library.   To review the descriptions of the 2009 conference sessions, go to http://www.lcc.edu/mhap/CONF2009/2009_Conference_Brochure_Web.pdf

To borrow the entire book or the handouts for individual sessions, contact Matt Beha at beham@lcc.edu or 517/483-1529.

Free Web Seminars Available on Depression and Substance Abuse in Late Life

The American Society on Aging has added three new pre-recorded web seminars to its webpage. The seminar presenter, Patrick Arbore, EdD, is the director and co-founder of the Center for Elderly Suicide Prevention and Grief-Related Services in San Francisco. Dr. Arbore has also been a featured presenter at the Michigan Mental Health and Aging Conference.      

These seminars, sponsored by the California Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs, examine the relationship between depression, suicide, and substance abuse or misuse in older adults. Dr. Arbore’s audio lectures are accompanied by slides that address the key points of the presentation. 

The seminars titles are:

• The Deadly Triangle: The Relationship between Depression, Alcoholism, Suicide and Older Adults
• Alcohol and Aging: Obstacles to Identification
• Communication Skills to Create Conversations with Older Adults Who May be Abusing/Misusing Substances

To access these seminars and other presentations on related topics, go to the ASA seminar webpage: http://www.asaging.org/webseminars/index.cfm

Training Program on Mental Health and Aging for Occupational Therapists

The Institute of Gerontology at Wayne State University has developed a DVD and CD-ROM training program to help OTs identify and assess mental health issues affecting older adults.  A multidisciplinary team, led by Drs. Peter Lichtenberg and Cathy Lysack, designed the modules on common mental health problems that may be encountered in working with older persons. The DVDs are:

• Introduction, Aging and Mental Health
• Understanding and Treating Depression
• Medications for Depression: Treatment and Consequences
• Family Caregiving
• Falls, Balance, and Exercise
• Driving Rehabilitation and Community Mobility
• Patient Video Clips

The DVDs include video clips of interactions between real therapists and older adults.  The CD-ROM provides supplemental training materials, including PowerPoint presentations, recommended assessment instruments, and additional references. This material may also be of interest to other nonmental health professionals who work with older persons. The training program, Integrating Mental Health into Occupational Therapy Practice with Older Adults, can be purchased for $75 (plus $5.00 for shipping/handling). For more information, go to the IOG webpage http://www.iog.wayne.edu/ and click on Sage Skills to Advance Gerontology Excellence, or you can call 313/577-2297.

OWL Addresses Mental Health in Late Life and Abuse of Older Women

OWL, The Voice of Midlife and Older Women, sponsored the annual Older Americans’ Mental Health Week, May 24-20, 2009. The OWL webpage, http://www.owl-national.org/Older_Americans_Mental_Health_Week.html provides basic information on mental health and aging, resources for professionals and the general public, and policy recommendations.

OWL has also released its 29^th Annual Mothers Day Policy Report, Elder Abuse: a Woman’s Issue. The 40-page document contains a number of articles on related topics, including the nature and extent of elder abuse, financial fraud and abuse, the relationship between medication misuse and abuse or neglect, and the status of legislation addressing elder abuse. The report can be downloaded from the OWL homepage: http://www.owl-national.org/Welcome.html