Behind all the recent headlines concerning mental health lies a stark statistic, Oregon ranks 49th worst nationally according to Mental Health America. Underneath this jarring number are clients and patients, and practitioners – and all of them seemingly struggling. In our continuing CitySpeak series, we will seek to begin a conversation about all this.
Jana Svboda is one of our community’s most outspoken and deeply thoughtful mental health practitioners. In our upcoming session, Svboda will reflect on the current state of mental health in our community, and share thoughts on possible paths forward. Svboda is a Licensed Clinical Social worker with 35 years experience.
There will be plenty of time allotted for questions and comments.
Mental Health America, an advocacy group, ranked Oregon as having the highest rate of mental illness in the country, while ranking us 16th in access to care, therefore the aforementioned cumulative ranking. In our own community, Samaritan Health announced they will be cutting back on available inpatient beds.
However, The Treatment Advocacy Center says that 50 inpatient beds per 100,000 people are needed to adequately treat mental illness within that population. Oregon merely has 16.2 beds per 100,000. They also state that Oregon incarcerates more people with mental illness than we hospitalize.
Time and place: Thursday, April 25, from 7 to 8:15 pm, at Old World Deli. CitySpeak events are free to the public and are presented by a partnership between the City Club of Corvallis and The Corvallis Advocate.