Title: Need to heal thyself?
Headings: Need to heal thyself?
Degree In Sight
Need to heal thyself?
To Tell or Not to Tell
Steps for Self-care
Letters to the Editor

Content: Only a few surveys have been conducted, and the magnitude of the problem appears to vary from school to school, depending in part on how they define mental health issues. A 2008 survey at the University of California–Irvine, for example, found 17 percent of students reported having a serious mental disorder and nearly 30 percent reported having a mental health concern that affected their well-being or academic performance. A survey from 2006 at Berkeley found that 45 percent of graduate students polled said they had a mental health issue that affected their well-being or academic performance, and almost 10 percent of respondents reported they had considered suicide in the past year. Even fewer studies have explored the prevalence of mental health problems among psychology graduate students. There have been studies of symptoms, however: A 2009 APA survey found that 87 percent of psychology graduate students reported experiencing anxiety, and 68 percent reported symptoms of depression. Even suicidal thoughts — with a prevalence of 19 percent — were relatively common. "The numbers suggest we're certainly not immune [to mental health problems]," says Phil Kleespies, PhD, a psychologist with the Department of Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System in West Roxbury, Mass., who co-led an inquiry on suicide risk among psychologists.... "Having a doctorate in psychology doesn't necessarily mean that you're going to be able to deal with your own personal depression." According to a report from California's Student Mental Health Committee, today's students are "experiencing mental health problems that are qualitatively different [from] and significantly more complex" than past generations. The explosion of medications to treat mental illnesses has enabled people who may not have been able to handle the stresses of higher education without drugs to enter college and thrive. "