Whole Health Learning and the “horrific collapse of adolescent mental health”

At a February address in New York senior advisor Larry Rosen MD described the potential for whole health learning to sustainably shift the course of adolescent mental health: as a safe and equitable  systemic solution to the ever-worsening problem confronting teens and their families in the US.  Dr. Rosen detailed the rationale and vision for what should be a public health model that can address the mental health crisis not only as it arises in middle and high school, but by beginning during students’ earliest years of schooling.

Dr. Rosen is an internationally recognized pioneer in pediatric integrative medicine.  He practices at his Whole Child Center in Oradell, NJ, and is chair of the WholeHealthED Health Advisory Board.  He was interviewed by Avery St. Onge, editor at Integrative Practitioner several weeks prior to his presentation at the Integrative Health Symposium on Feb. 25.

Listen to the Podcast Here:

WholeHealthED: Solving the Adolescent Mental Health Crisis with Integrative Care

Recent Context:

In the weeks prior to the symposium more reports and articles appears outlining and defining the scope of this national emergency.

Of note is the report from the CDC: “Youth Risk Behavior Survey” which compiles “multiple years of national YRBS data to highlight focus areas with important implications for adolescent health and well-being:

• sexual behavior
• substance use
• experiencing violence
• mental health and suicidal thoughts and behaviors”

The study also listed a very short list of Protective Factors, defined as “the characteristics, conditions, and behaviors that improve health outcomes or reduce the effects of stressful life events and other risk factors.”  Primarily they are shown as:

“School connectedness, which is the feeling among adolescents that people at their school care about them, their well-being, and success, has long-lasting protective effects for adolescents

“Parental monitoring is associated with decreased sexual risk, substance use, experiences of violence, and suicidal thoughts and behaviors.”

As is often the case, such recommendations rarely reach down in to the confines of the schoolyard to identify specific activities or programs in which children are involved.  The report however, leaves room — much more room — for more expansive approaches:

“Although the primary goal of schools is academic learning, they also play a critical role in shaping mental, physical, and social growth.  More than 95% of children and adolescents in the U.S. spend much of their daily lives in school providing a considerable opportunity to foster the knowledge and skills to shape behaviors and experiences, but also the responsibility to ensure that all learning is done in a safe and supportive school environment.”

Schools have access to an array of whole health learning activities that have been shown to foster behaviors that can offset stress and the impact of factors that often compromise their wellbeing and ability to learn and be successful socially, which might be considered the most potent “protective factors” we have available.

Reference:

A short article recommending that current efforts designed to address the disruptions of COVID on the wellbeing of school children and across society at large make sure to encompass all effective options, even if they originate in non-usual places: like school gardens.

“Wellbeing can no longer be seen as an ancillary activity in our schools.” (Link to Medium)