College Mental Health and COVID-19

When the University of Richmond announced that learning would switch to entirely remote education due to COVID-19, my heart sunk as I scrolled through the email. I knew it was coming amidst the plethora of bad news, but leaving Richmond for the rest of the year felt...

Proposed State Budget Great Opportunity for Mental Health

[Condensed from our opinion column published March 2, 2020 in the Richmond Times Dispatch.] Virginia ranks 37th out of 51 states and the District of Columbia in terms of ease of access to mental health care. For years Virginia has funded hospital beds at the expense...

Advocacy Day 2020

There was a mother who lost her son to addiction and suicide. A Navy veteran described not being able to find help when discharged from service. The Occupational Therapist spoke of overwhelming workloads providing early intervention support for...

College Student Mental Health

“We’re overwhelmed.” I heard this over and over from college counselors who stopped by our exhibit table at the Virginia Counselors Association conference last month. At both public and private universities, in rural and urban areas of Virginia, the number of students...

Defending Current Health Care Protections

Mental Health America of Virginia was invited to Sen. Mark Warner’s (D-VA) November 15th roundtable on defending healthcare and protections for pre-existing conditions. Hosted by Richmond’s Health Brigade clinic, participants from health advocacy...