Community Prevention Day

SAMHSA Administrator Pamela S. Hyde, J.D., welcomed hundreds of local youth, prevention professionals, and others to SAMHSA’s 2011 Community Prevention Day on February 7. (See photo gallery.)

The event, “Future by Design, Behavioral Health in Action,” included a panel on SAMHSA’s Strategic Initiative for the Prevention of Substance Abuse and Mental Illness and how to create “prevention prepared communities.”

At the working lunch, U.S. Surgeon General Regina M. Benjamin, M.D., M.B.A., talked to attendees on prevention’s role in health reform.

Other topics for the day included a workshop on “Everything You Wanted to Know about State and Community Prevention, But Were Afraid to Ask.”

On the topic of mental health, SAMHSA’s Dr. Richard McKeon’s workshop explained the importance of the National Strategy for Suicide Prevention and presented an overview of the Garrett Lee Smith Campus Suicide and State/Tribal Suicide grant programs.

Another workshop, “Recovery and Behavioral Health Care Integration,” offered strategies for reaching out to multiple audiences on the opportunities health reform provides. In addition, SAMHSA facilitators, Paolo del Vecchio and Ivette Torres, emphasized the importance of raising awareness that treatment and recovery services improve people’s well-being and overall health.

For more information, visit the SAMHSA website.

Photo: SAMHSA’s 2011 Community Prevention Day took place on February 7.