APA Annual Meeting

The 2010 APA Annual Meeting will be in New Orleans May 22-26, 2010. The meeting features more than 500 scientific sessions, including guest lecturers, new research poster sessions, networking opportunities and up to 58 professional education credits. The following are ASHP highlights for the meeting:

To obtain information, please contact Maria C. Sciancalepore 732-690-4507.

XIII Spanish Congress of Psychiatry
Madrid, Spain - October 19-24, 2009

1 st Biennial National Latino Mental Health Conference - Fortificando Nuestras Competencies Culturales - November 9-10, 2009 - Miami, FL

Dear Friend of the National Resource Center for Hispanic Mental Health:

The National Resource Center for Hispanic Mental Health (NRCHMH) is pleased to announce the release of its Conference Program for its 1 st Biennial National Latino Mental Health Conference, titled Fortificando Nuestras Competencies Culturales. The conference, which will be held on November 9-10, 2009 at the Wyndham Miami Airport Hotel and Executive Meeting Center in Miami, Florida, will host 20 individual workshops and four keynote/plenary sessions with world-renowned Latino mental health leaders Drs. William A Vega, Gloria Bonilla-Santiago and Sergio Aguilar-Gaxiola, and other behavioral health professionals working on addressing depression in the Latino community.  A copy of the conference program can be found at www.nrchmh.org.  Please note that Online Registration will be open by the close of business today, September 30, 2009.  Online registration is available at www.nrchmh.org, as is a copy of the Conference Program Book Ad Opportunities Order Form. 

The NRCHMH welcomes your participation and highly encourages early registration as space is limited to the first 500 registrants.  In addition to the great conference program being offered, participants are invited to participate in a Special Welcoming Reception on Sunday, November 8, 2009 from 6 PM to 8 PM at the conference venue to network with the anticipated 300-500 event participants.  Participants are also invited to consider spending some quality time on the high sea during an optional Special Night Out on the Town 3 ½ hour Yacht excursion around Biscayne Bay, Miami.

The national conference has much to offer all attendees.  Behavioral Health Agency Administrators will find several opportunities aimed at enhancing their ability to develop or strengthen their organizational cultural competence efforts, while direct service behavioral health providers will find numerous learning opportunities aimed at increasing their knowledge on how to best attract, retain, engage and serve Hispanics.   Continuing Education Units for various behavioral health disciplines such as psychologists, social workers, counselors, and nurses are being provided through the conference co-provider, the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey – University Behavioral HealthCare.  More information on this can be found in the conference program book. 

Sponsorships from our corporate partners enable NRCHMH to achieve its critical mission of ensuring that individuals from the nation's largest racial and ethnic minority group  have equal access to quality behavioral health care.  NRCHMH greatly appreciates the generous charitable contributions received to date from AstraZeneca, Otsuka Pharmaceuticals and Janssen, a division of Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc., none of whom had or will have any control over the conference's content, and the support of the United States Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health and Wyeth Pharmaceuticals for event specific project activities being held at the conference.  Please note that additional sponsorship opportunities are available and sincerely needed to ensure a highly successful, meaningful and impactful event.  Interested funding partners can contact me directly at 609-838-5488, ext. 205 to explore these available opportunities.

I hope to see you all there.  Thank you for your past and anticipated ongoing support.

Before leaving you and you begin packing your bags, I would like to extend a special thank you to the Event Co-Sponsors and the Conference Planning Committee:

Conference Co-Sponsors
American Society of Hispanic Psychiatry   
Latino Behavioral Health Institute
National Association of Puerto Rican and Hispanic Social Workers Association
National Latino Behavioral Health Association
National Latina/o Psychological Association
NAMI National
Westchester Healthcare Network

Conference Planning Committee Members
Henry Acosta, M.A., M.S.W., L.S.W. – Executive Director, National Resource Center for Hispanic Mental Health
Lynda Ayala, L.M.S.W., National Association of Puerto Rican and Hispanic Social Workers
Guillermo Brito, Ph.D. – Executive Director, National Latino Behavioral Health Association
Maria Jose Carrasco, M.P.A. – Director, Multicultural Action Center, NAMI National
Edward A. Delgado-Romero, Ph.D. – President, National Latina/o Psychological Association; Associate Professor, Department of Counseling and Human Development Services, University of Georgia
Peter J. Guarnaccia, Ph.D. – Investigator, Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
Igda Martinez, Psy.D. - Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
Evelyn Melo, L.M.H.C. – President, Melo Counseling Services

Best wishes and continued success to you all. Thank you for your past and ongoing support.

Sincerely,

Henry Acosta, MA, MSW, LSW
Executive Director, National Resource Center for Hispanic Mental Health, and
Project Director, Partners for Culturally Competent Behavioral Health Service Delivery to Hispanics, New Jersey Mental Health Institute Inc.
3575 Quakerbridge Road, Suite 102
Mercerville, New Jersey 08619
Telephone: (609) 838-5488, ext. 205
Fax:       (609) 838-5480
E-mail:    hacosta@nrchmh.org or hacosta@njmhi.org
Website:   http://www.nrchmh.org or http://www.njmhi.org

NEWS FROM CAMBRIDGE HEALTH ALLIANCE

The Award honors a prominent Hispanic statesman or spokesperson and raises awareness of the problems and goals of Hispanics. Dr. Alegría recently accepted the prize at the APA's 2009 Annual Meeting, held in San Francisco, where she also delivered the Simon Bolivar Lecture, titled "Prevalence, Risk, and Correlates of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Across Ethnic and Racial Minority Groups in the U.S."

Dr. Alegría has forged an international reputation for her research on disparities in mental health and substance abuse services and her commitment to improving access, equity, and quality of these services for disadvantaged and minority populations. In addition to her leadership role at the Center for Multicultural Mental Health Research, she is a professor of psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. She is currently the principal investigator of two NIMH-funded research studies: the Advanced Center for Mental Health Disparities, which focuses on research to increase the understanding of factors affecting mental health service disparities in Latinos and other minorities, and the National Latino and Asian American Study, a large epidemiological national study.

The mission of the Center for Multicultural Mental Health Research is to generate innovative mental health services research that impacts policy, practice, and service delivery for multicultural populations. The Center's staff is comprised of an interdisciplinary group of psychologists, social policy analysts, health economists, psychiatrists, data analysts, sociologists, and other professionals that assist in the research and analysis of Center projects. For more information: www.multiculturalmentalhealth.org.

Cambridge Health Alliance is an innovative, award-winning health system that provides high quality care in Cambridge, Somerville, and Boston's metro-north communities. It includes three hospital campuses, a network of primary care and specialty practices, the Cambridge Public Health Dept., and the Network Health plan. CHA is a Harvard Medical School teaching affiliate and is also affiliated with Harvard School of Public Health, Harvard School of Dental Medicine, and Tufts University School of Medicine. Visit us online at www.challiance.org.