mental health

As Default Deadline Nears, Congress Continues Debate Debt Ceiling Plan

Congresswomen Lynn Jenkins (R-Kan.) and Doris Matsui (D-Calif.) introduced the Mental Health First Aid Act, a bill authorizing $20 million in grants for Mental Health First Aid trainings around the country. The proposed legislation is the counterpart to a Senate bill (S. 711) introduced in March by Senators Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.),… Keep reading →

As Default Deadline Nears, Congress Continues Debate Debt Ceiling Plan

Senators Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), with nine additional cosponsors, introduced a bill to amend the Public Service Health Act Wednesday night to authorize $20 million in grants for Mental Health First Aid trainings around the country. This program gives emergency services personnel, police officers, educators, primary care professionals, students and others the… Keep reading →

This is one in a series of articles about innovation at the Department of Veterans Affairs and part of a larger series on innovation at agencies across the federal government.

A mobile app originally developed to aid veterans has been offered to mental health personnel helping Hurricane Sandy’s victims, an example of how innovation and technology within the federal government can have a broader reach than ever before. Keep reading →


When Neal Brown began his federal career as an intern with the National Institute of Mental Health nearly 40 years ago, life was very different for Americans with mental illness. Beyond carrying a significant social stigma, they often were removed from their communities and placed in institutions, with no say in their treatment and sometimes living under abusive conditions.

In those intervening years, Brown has become a leading federal advocate for shifting care and government resources from the large psychiatric institutions toward a less expensive community-based rehabilitative model. In the process, he has helped bring mental health consumers into policy development, program design and services implementation at the federal, state and local government levels. Keep reading →