Anxiety Disorders

As we are experiencing heat domes across the planet, there is emerging evidence from recent publications that heat, among effects on many other human activities, can also have profound effects on mental health. - Martin Paulus, PhD

Panic isn’t what you think it is. It’s not an attack at all, and that’s a misleading name for it. It’s you having an internal reaction of fear – your heart rate changes, your muscles tense up, your stomach feels bad, you have scary thoughts of calamities, and so on.

The growing mental health crisis is indisputably affecting our youth. In fact, the pediatric mental health crisis has been called the “top patient safety threat” of 2023.

Check out our ADAA members' new books that offer help for the public and support for professionals.

In collaboration with The Reach Institute, Dr. Wallace explains how parents can decrease the impact of anxiety on children and teens to help them function their best and find more joy in their lives.

Dr. Widge presented at ADAA’s 2023 conference on how he believes “mental disorders are brain network disorders” and how treatments like Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS), Vagus Nerve Stimulation (VNS) and Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) are quite possibly the wave of the future for certain mood and anxiety disorders, and particularly those that are treatment-resistant. 

Shame is “just” a feeling, but it can become very big and very painful. If it feels very big, it doesn’t mean there is something even worse about you, but rather that there are layers to it. We can make it smaller and more manageable by talking about it and listening to it. When you understand it and the feeling is smaller, it will be easier for you to work with it.  

Now that telehealth and in-person services are available, what are important factors for clinicians, youth, and families to consider?

The headlines and the CDC report are indeed alarming, but they should serve as a wakeup call to all of us. Yes, we should think seriously about why we are seeing a steep decline in the mental health of teenage girls, but we have to come together now as parents, family, friends, educators, clinicians, providers, and as a society to support, enhance and establish more preventive measures for our youth.

Working with Black churches to create a better today and a much better tomorrow in the field (literally) of mental health care for African Americans are three Black leaders in mental health who will present at the 2023 ADAA Conference. ADAA is excited to have Bernadine Waller, PhD, Atasha Jordan, MBA, MD and Kimberly Arnold, MPH, PhD discuss their work, research and findings in a presentation titled Implementing Evidence-Based Mental Health Interventions in Black Churches.