This month, I would like to take a break from our recent series about Psychiatry to highlight Mental Illness Awareness Week, which is October 6th-12th this year. As people who work at AWARE, we probably don’t need a reminder than mental illness is real and prevalent. However, we do need to remind ourselves that not everyone else knows this. Stigma, poor mental health education, lack of resources in some areas, and the complexities of day-to-day life make it easy for most folks to push mental health out of sight and out of mind (pun intended). Even as a psychiatrist, I sometimes forget just how prevalent mental illness is (it’s basically the air I breathe, so I can take it for granted at times). Therefore, I’m going to share some information about the prevalence of mental illness and then some ways we can all get more involved in helping.
One in five adults experience mental illness each year. This is just the yearly prevalence – the chances of a person experiencing mental illness at any point in their life is much higher. For kids, the numbers are similar – one in six youth experience a mental health disorder each year. For kids and adults, that means about 200,000 Montanans experience mental illness every single year. However, there are some groups in Montana who are at even higher risk, including American Indians and LGBTQ+ individuals. I think these numbers help illuminate the fact that we can not “get away” from mental illness. Everywhere we go, we are interacting with people who are experiencing a mental illness. These are our family members, partners, friends, neighbors, colleagues, church buddies, and employees at the establishments we patronize.
One in twenty adults in the US experience a serious mental illness each year. This would include things like severe depression/anxiety, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, eating disorders, and many others. Many of these folks are our clients here at AWARE, but plenty of others do not have access to good care yet. While some of these folks may appear impaired when we see them in society, many do not. So once again, I think it’s important to remember that these are people we care about and interact with (not just at work) every day in the community. It’s impossible to know everything that is going on in someone’s life based on how they present on the outside, so I like to remind myself that I don’t know their story, but I can choose kindness and grace.
Of the folks with mental illness, less than half tend to actually receive treatment each year. Can you imagine if this were true for, say, heart disease? It’s unacceptable, but we can all be proud to work for an agency that is trying to be the solution in this department. As of 2023, 164 million people in the US live in a Mental Health Professional Shortage Area. In Montana, every county except Yellowstone County is included in this statistic. Treatment works for mental illness. But it only works if folks have access, so please keep fighting the good fight!
Lastly, suicide is a leading cause of death, especially for young people (2nd cause of death in people aged 10-34 years). The risks are higher for some groups including LGBTQ+ individuals and young men of color (including American Indian). In the mountain west, and Montana especially, suicide rates are even higher still for reasons that aren’t fully understood (likely a combination of resource shortages and environmental factors like altitude). Once again, I’d just like to stress that treatment works! Most people who are suicidal are experiencing a mental illness, in addition to social factors like isolation, grief, and hopelessness. We can help with all of those things. In addition to preventative measures like community-based care, we should all be evangelists of the national crisis line – 988. This line is now live in all 50 states, and we can encourage anyone we know to use it if they need support in a crisis.
If you or someone you know is experiencing symptoms of mental illness, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Let someone know what you’re going through; you don’t have to face this alone. Support is available, and taking that first step can make all the difference.
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