Health

When mental illness strikes a loved one, the first person many families turn to is often a faith-based leader: a priest, a minister, a rabbi, or an imam.

The Ninth Annual Muslim Mental Health Conference aims to help clergy do a better job of helping members of their congregation who are suffering from mental illness.

The conference will run April 13-14th at the Michigan State University Department of Psychiatry.

In every country in the world, women are more likely than men to experience more stress, chronic disease, anxiety and be victims of violence. Yet, women live longer than men. Why? 

The future of mental health in the state of Michigan is at a crossroads. Governor Rick Snyder has $2.4 billion in mental health care funding to spend. Lawmakers and advocates on both sides of the health care debate are trying to determine who should manage that money.

Jerri Nicole Wright is a Lansing resident and longtime consumer of state mental health service. She joined Stateside to talk about her journey through Michigan's mental health care system.

The weight of terminally-ill patients can play a role in the type of treatment they receive toward the end of their lives.

Today on Stateside, a new study links childhood lead exposure to lower IQ in adults across socioeconomic status. And, the mystery of Michigan's most famous UFO sighting lives on.

Switching Flint to water from the Flint River had devastating effects for residents, particularly its children. 

Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha first sounded that alarm in the summer of 2015. Her tests proved that after Flint switched the source of its drinking water, blood lead levels in Flint kids skyrocketed.

And that was later confirmed by a CDC analysis. It found that children who drank Flint water had a 50% higher risk of dangerously elevated blood lead levels than before the switch.

That analysis couldn't say exactly how many kids were affected, or what their futures hold.

A study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association may hold some answers. Researchers from Duke University studied childhood lead exposure and adult outcomes.

A personal tragedy can open your eyes to things that had previously been out of sight and out of mind.

For Abby Dart, it was her husband’s suicide in 2004. That loss opened her eyes to the stigma we’ve built up around mental health problems. She believes that stigma killed her husband Steve.

Today on Stateside, we hear about a mother's fight to improve Michigan's low vaccination rates after losing her daughter to whooping cough. And, an author describes how she freed herself from an "OCD prison." She offers advice to others trying to do the same.

Baby Francesca was just 12 weeks old when she came down with a cough. Nine days later, she died of pertussis, better known as whooping cough.

Some call it the Doubting Disease.

OCD—Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder—is when you've got recurring, uncontrollable thoughts and behaviors. 

Governor Rick Snyder wants the $2.4 billion in mental health Medicaid money to be turned over to private insurance companies to manage.

He believes that Medicaid funds will be better spent and more people with behavioral issues and mental illnesses will be better served. Mental health would be integrated with physical health under the HMOs.

Many mental health advocates and patients don’t like the idea.

Crying at work — we’ve all done it.

So, when something negative happens at work, like a bad performance review, what can you do to save face after shedding a few tears? 

Julia Lee, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan's Center for Positive Organizations and soon-to-be assistant professor at the Ross School of Business, researched crying at work in a new study.

Expanding Medicaid was a key part of the Affordable Care Act. In our state, it's known as Healthy Michigan, and it has meant health care coverage for more than 600,000 people.

But if you wind up in the criminal justice system, even if its just pre-trial detention, Medicaid benefits turn off immediately.

Researchers at the University of Michigan say excluding inmates from Medicaid is driving up costs and hurting the health of inmates.

President Trump’s immigration ban of seven countries with predominantly Muslim populations is causing consequences to healthcare.

An article for The Conversation outlines what’s at stake.

While the immigration ban is temporarily suspended by the courts, the authors of the article write that the travel ban has already had significant consequences.

For more than a year, Flint residents have been told to use filters on their taps to screen lead from their drinking water. Filters on kitchen faucets are as much a part of everyday life in Flint as bottled water. Specialized filters were one of the first responses to Flint’s lead tainted tap water crisis.  

However, state officials and others are changing their message on filters.

Even just a few months ago, they were still strongly urging their use.

Now, it’s more of a mild suggestion.

A new law recently signed by Governor Rick Snyder means home birth midwives in Michigan will need to be licensed.

What does this mean for women who want to give birth at home in Michigan?

The warnings about "superbug infections" and over prescribing antibiotics have been getting stronger and louder in recent years. Yet, it's still happening and we are seeing people die from infections that are caused by these so-called superbugs.

The Centers for Disease Control, for example, is telling us that every year 75,000 Americans with hospital-aquired infections are dying while they're in the hospital.

Trauma comes in many forms: from refugees who were forced to walk over dead bodies as a child on the way to school in a war-torn country, to survivors of sexual assault, to the spiritual trauma many feel living in a nation that is divided and bitter.

Dr. Farha Abbasi, an assistant professor of psychiatry at Michigan State University, joined Stateside to talk about her definition of trauma, what can cause it and how to treat it.