New Mental Health & Substance Abuse Secretary Now Running SAMHSA

(7-9-21) Dr. Miriam E. Delphin-Rittmon sailed through a recent U.S. Senate confirmation hearing and is now the Assistant Secretary of Mental Health and Substance Abuse at the U.S. Health and Human Services Department. In her written testimony, she stated: “Emphasizing recovery and addressing equity and culture in behavioral health service delivery and system development are prominent themes in my work…”

She replaced Dr. Elinore McCance-Katz who has taken a senior position inside the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.

Dr. Delphin-Rittmon previously served as Commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS) for six years where, she said, her “focus has been on promoting recovery-oriented, integrated, and culturally responsive services and systems that foster dignity, respect, and meaningful community inclusion of the individuals we are entrusted to serve.”

Her nomination by the Biden Administration was strongly backed by peer and disability organizations that represent individuals with mental illnesses and disabilities. More than thirty such organizations signed a letter of support endorsing her confirmation, including the New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services headed by well-known advocate, Harvey Rosenthal, the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, Gould Farm, and the American Association for People with Disabilities.

She is expected to bring a different approach to SAMHSA, the government’s biggest mental health and substance abuse funder. President Trump’s nomination, Dr. McCance-Katz, strongly backed greater use of Assisted Outpatient Treatment. She was supported by Dr. E. Fuller Torrey, the late D. J. Jaffe and the Treatment Advocacy Center. In a 2018 newspaper interview, Dr. Delphin-Rittmon said she didn’t support AOT in her state. “We all know for many people choice, or being stripped of certain choices, is connected to trauma within their own lives. We don’t want to perpetuate that in the treatment system.”

Outgoing Dr. McCance-Katz now at DEA

Before leaving office, Dr. McCance-Katz was criticized for questioning during a podcast whether fears of the corona virus were overblown. In her new job as a legislative policy analyst at the DEA, she will  help shape the Biden administration’s strategy on drug enforcement, particularly with Biden’s nominee to run DEA who is still awaiting Senate confirmation.

With endorsements from both of her home state Senators and Connecticut’s governor, Dr. Delphin-Rittmon was easily confirmed. Here is here opening statement and link to the video of her confirmation hearing.

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Judge Steven Leifman

(7-6-21) The Biden Administration missed a real opportunity to improve the lives of those struggling with mental illnesses and addictions when it didn’t nominate Miami-Dade Judge Steven Leifman to be the next Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Abuse.  Judge Leifman is the reformer who allowed me access into the Miami Detention Center for ten months to follow prisoners with mental illnesses through our criminal justice system, which resulted in my book, CRAZY: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness. (CRAZY refers to our system, not individuals such as my son.) He is an inspirational crusader for mental health reform who has worked tirelessly to stop the inappropriate incarceration of individuals whose only real crime is that they got sick.

On July 8th, you can hear him speak and see a fabulous documentary sponsored by Dr. Norman Ornstein by registering here. There is no charge for this opportunity, which is being organized by Janet Hays with Healing Minds Nola.

Please tune in and learn what this amazing advocate has accomplished in Miami-Dade County and could do for the rest of our nation if given the opportunity by our federal government.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER Healing Minds NOLA is honored to host a screening of the much talked about Film Documentary: “Definition of Insanity”. After the screening, Judge Steven Leifman will join a panel discussion to be moderated by Dr. Norman Ornstein, an emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and vice president of The Matthew Harris Ornstein Memorial Foundation, with the following very special guests: Cindy A. Schwartz, Project Director of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida Criminal Mental Health Project- Jail Diversion Programs. Judge Alan Zaunbrecher, 22nd Judicial District Court, State of Louisiana. Nick Richard, Executive Director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) St. Tammany, La. Learn more about our speakers here! Untreated mental illness is a crisis not only in Louisiana but across America. On Thursday, July 8th from 5:30pm-8pm CST, find out how one Miami-Dade County Judge, Steven Leifman, is bucking the criminal justice system to lead the nation in DEcriminalizing mental illness. “Definition of Insanity” demonstrates a novel approach to solving the mental health crisis that could be the model to tackle the much larger epidemic throughout America We hope you will join us!

Janet Hays Director – Healing Minds NOLA (504) 274 6091

This is Not About Mental Health. It is about disabilities, resilience, and patriotism. Happy Fourth of July. 

( From My Files Friday) My sister-in-law, Dana Davis, was deaf but she never let her lack of hearing slow her down. When she was a teenager, the local swimming pool said she couldn’t be a lifeguard. My wife, Patti, who was two years older than her sister, and Dana demanded an audience with the pool’s board of directors and convinced its members to give Dana a shot.

She got the job and did great at it.

Dana and her husband, Donnie, had one child, Matthew. He was born with Absent Radius Syndrome and foreshortened arms. When the radius bone is missing the thumb does not form and the wrist is not supported, therefore Matt’s hands are curved.  My son, Tony, who was little when Matt was born, said that God must have known what He was doing when He picked a family for Matt because Dana would know what it was like to be different.

She didn’t lower her expectations when it came to Matt.

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Psychiatrist Dr. Satel spent a year in Ironton helping patients

(6-28-21) Dr. Sally Satel, a practicing psychiatrist who works at a methadone clinic in Washington, D.C., told me over lunch one day about her plan to spend a year in an economically depressed Appalachia town treating patients for addiction.

When she moved to  Ironton, Ohio, population 11,200, for twelve months, I wondered what she would discover.

She has now returned to Washington and has written two articles and been interviewed by journalist Nick Gillespie in Reason magazine.

Gillespie writes: Dr. Satel, “challenges conventional theories of addiction that characterize it as a disease like diabetes or Alzheimer’s. Substance abuse, she says, derives from both inborn predilections and a person’s environment, or what she calls ‘dark genies’ and  ‘dark horizons.’ Satel stresses that the best way forward is to give individuals tools to make better use decisions while improving their chances to live lives with open-ended futures.”

“You cannot ‘catch’ addiction,” Dr. Satel writes. Her year in Ironton convinced her that drug/alcohol addictions are not so simply explained by saying an individual got hooked because they drank their first beer or swallowed their first opioid. Rather those treating an addiction must spend time trying to uncover the underlying causes – environmental events or what is missing in someone’s life – to truly understand. (Dr. Satel can be reached at slsatel@gmail)

Bravo!

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Norris Church and Norman Mailer 1981 Photo By Adam Scull/Alamy

This is NOT about mental health. 

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(6-21-21) What is treatment? “Too often, patients spend most the day wallowing in their misery and uncertainty waiting for the next meal or group meeting.”

A recent email from a frequent patient at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, Virginia, caught my attention. It echos complaints which I have heard about the quality of care available to individuals with mental illnesses. The writer specifically mentioned a disconnect between a patient and psychiatrist.

In my speeches, I often talk about how my son has had seven psychiatrist since his first break, but only two have taken the time to learn anything personal about him. They simply listen to his symptoms, prescribing medication and send him out the door – usually in under 15 minutes, which is all the time an insurance company wants to reimburse.

But I believe treating the brain also requires treating the whole person.

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