News Archive
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Nonprofit and volunteer veterans groups, along with the Department of Defense, rightly focus on the mental health needs of the warriors who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their children deserve attention as well. After more than a decade of living with the separations and uncertainties endemic to military life, many children from military families are paying the emotional and psychological costs.
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Edgar Rico was 24 when his life changed forever.
It wasn’t graduating from college or starting a new career, but it was a car accident that broke his neck and left him paralyzed from the neck down. An avid athlete who played baseball and soccer, Rico was told by doctors that not only would he never again be able to play the sports he loved, but that he would never be able to do anything else but lie in a bed. Unwilling to accept this prognosis, Rico refused to feel sorry for himself and instead fought to give himself opportunities to live a normal life.
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When veterans come home, they may face multiple health challenges—physical, mental and psychological.
To be better prepared to serve them, about 40 students from the University of Southern California and Mount St. Mary’s College participated in an interprofessional workshop aimed at creating collaborative care strategies for veterans and military families.
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Adolescents with a parent or sibling who has been deployed are more likely than their nonmilitary peers to feel depressed, contemplate suicide and report poorer overall well-being, according to a USC study of 14,299 adolescents in California. More than 13 percent of those in the study had parents or siblings in the military.
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USC School of Social Work post-doctoral fellow, Erin Kelly, has received a two-year $100,000 award from the highly competitive Friends of The Semel Institute Scholar Program at the University of California, Los Angeles. The award is granted to fellows and junior faculty to support their research efforts in advancing treatment interventions for mental illness. Kelly was one of three scholars out of 44 applicants to receive the award.
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Most national militaries have challenging basic training programs to ensure new members' physical fitness. Few, however, devote as much time to mental health.
And that may come as a detriment. A growing body of research suggests that targeted mental health training lessens the likelihood of later showing symptoms of post-traumatic stress and depression, or of sleep and substance problems for active duty service members and veterans.
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Omar Lopez, clinical assistant professor in field education at the USC School of Social Work, has been recognized by San Diego Metro magazine with one of its 2013 40 Under 40 Awards, which annually honors the best and brightest minds in the area.
Lopez was chosen from a record 115 nominations and said the distinction of the award added to its personal significance.
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Eighteen and pregnant, Jessica Chandler was terrified. Taken away from her mentally ill mother and placed into the foster care system as a child, she wanted to be a good parent.
"But I didn't really know what that meant," said Chandler, now a graduate student at Cal State Northridge.
Although she got help from programs that taught her about child rearing, two of her sisters were less fortunate. They struggled with parenting and lost their children to the same system that once claimed them.
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A social worker listens to a client talk about what’s on her mind. The client, an elderly woman who lives on her own and has several chronic illnesses, is very depressed and has trouble managing her daily life. The social worker talks the client through these problems, helping her find ways to manage her various doctor appointments and medications, as well as how to improve her mood so she can better tackle day-to-day tasks.
Sounds like any normal counseling session, but it’s not.
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Alma Fowlkes, MSW ’65, may have retired from the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services in 1993, but she has never stopped doing social work over the last 20 years. A committed volunteer for the California Social Welfare Archives (CSWA) at the USC School of Social Work, Fowlkes was recently honored by the USC Alumni Association with the USC Widney Alumni House Award, which recognizes outstanding sustained volunteer service and contributions to the Trojan Family.