UCLA to offer free mental health screening, treatment to all incoming students

Speaking before dozens of influential business and civic leaders about mental health in the workplace, UCLA Chancellor Gene Block announced today the university will for the first time offer free mental health screening and, if appropriate, treatment, to all incoming freshmen and transfer students.“It affects about 350 million people worldwide, and yet, in my view, depression remains somewhat overlooked and understudied. That depression has not been identified as our number one health issue astounds me,” said Block during his keynote speech at the inauguralOne Mind Initiative at Work summit.The One Mind Initiative was founded by Garen and Shari Staglin as a part of theOne Mind Institute, a public nonprofit dedicated to raising awareness, funding research and finding solutions for brain illnesses.The free mental health screenings, which will eventually be made available to the entire UCLA community, are just one part of theUCLA Depression Grand Challenge, a campuswide effort to reduce the health and economic impacts of depression by half globally by the year 2050. The online screening and treatment program is thought to be the first-ever campuswide mental health screening program conducted at a university.“Depression has no regard for demographics,” Block told the audience in a hotel conference room in St. Helena, California in Napa Valley.Garen Staglin said that UCLA ’s efforts may serve as a model for how other businesses and institutions tackle the issue of mental...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news