Please click the Play Video button to watch the video prior to joining the Q&A.
Full Description: At every adolescent well visit, the provider listens to the patient’s heart and lungs for abnormalities, which are extremely rare for children and adolescents. However, many primary care providers are still not consistently screening for mental health concerns, even though suicide is the second leading cause of death for 13-19-year-olds, and rates of anxiety and depression among adolescents have increased significantly in the past few years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These trends highlight a need for primary care providers to be trained in the identification, treatment, and management of mental illness and suicidal ideation among youth.
The Adolescent Health Initiative, in partnership with health care professionals in the fields of adolescent medicine and psychiatry, and youth, created a suite of resources to strengthen the quality-of-care primary care providers give youth struggling with mental health concerns and suicidal ideation. During this session, we will review these resources, which include AHI’s Adolescent Mental Health Starter Guide, a mini-toolkit that offers concrete and actionable steps to improve adolescent mental health care, and our Timely Topic on Adolescent Suicide Prevention in Primary Care, an online e-training for providers. We will discuss the current state of adolescent mental health and suicide in the United States, the value of training providers on these topics, and review best practices. This includes information on youth-friendly behaviors for stigma reduction, best practices around screening and treatment referral, and strategies providers can implement in their practice. Youth voices will also be integrated throughout this session in the form of video and text testimonials.
Abbreviated Description: Many primary care providers are still not consistently screening for mental health concerns in adolescent patients, even though suicide is the second leading cause of death for 13-19-year-olds, and rates of anxiety and depression among adolescents have increased significantly in the past few years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. During this session, we will review a suite of resources created by the Adolescent Health Initiative to improve adolescent mental health care in the primary care setting. We will also discuss the current state of adolescent mental health and suicide in the United States, the value of training providers on these topics, and review best practices around mental health and suicide prevention and support in the primary care setting.
