Posted on October 18, 2004 at 3:45 p.m.
BIRMINGHAM, AL — WBHM, a public service radio station licensed through the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), is partnering with the UAB School of Public Health and Oasis Women’s Counseling Center to produce “Making Sense of Mental Illness.” The program, a year-long broadcast and community outreach initiative, will begin in January.
It’s part of the Sound Partners for Community Health program administered by the Benton Foundation and funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The program supports partnerships between public broadcasters, like WBHM, community organizations and other media to increase awareness of health issues and to facilitate community involvement in decision-making that affects public health.
“Undiagnosed and mistreated mental illness is a serious national health problem, especially among African Americans and other minority groups,” said Dr. Max Michael, dean of UAB’s School of Public Health. “It’s an underlying cause of many social problems, ranging from homelessness to unemployment to prison overcrowding.”
“Making Sense of Mental Health,” will focus on increasing awareness of mental health issues, reducing the stigma associated with mental illness and educating the community about treatment programs. “We especially want to reach low- and moderate-income women and children, and minority groups,” said Tanya Ott, news director with WBHM radio.
WBHM’s role will include producing one feature story each week for a year focusing on different aspects of mental illness, such as postpartum depression and financing mental health care. “We also will produce two half-hour documentaries on mental illness and children, specifically mental health services offered to foster children and incarcerated juveniles,” Ott said.
WBHM also will provide information on its Web site and through weekly e-mails highlighting the latest news in mental health. “We’ll also co-host and broadcast a year-end community forum on mental health with Oasis Women’s Counseling Center,” Ott said.
For its part, UAB’s School of Public Health will incorporate mental illness into the storyline of its radio soap opera, BODYLOVE, which airs weekly on WJLD-AM in Birmingham and 14 other radio stations across the state. “BODYLOVE is an entertaining approach to providing listeners with important information about their health, such as diabetes care, heart health, coping with stress and good nutrition,” Michael said. “The show is an ideal setting for broaching the topic of mental health with African Americans, the show’s target audience.”
The show also will feature mental health experts during some call-in segments. “Each 12- to 19-minute episode of the show is followed by a question-and-answer period,” Michael said. “This provides listeners an opportunity to ask questions and talk about topics discussed during the show.”
Oasis will lead the partnership’s community outreach activities. “Oasis will host community forums throughout the year for women and girls on topics such as depression, body image and domestic violence,” Michael said. “It’ll also host workshops for social workers, nurses, physicians and other healthcare professionals.”
National Depression Screening Day, usually held in October, will offer another opportunity for community outreach. “Oasis, which is devoted to providing counseling and education programs for low-income women, is the perfect community partner to lead our outreach efforts in distributing educational materials and offering screenings,” Michael said. “On National Depression Screening Day we hope to screen at least 100 women.”
For more information about “Making Sense of Mental Health,” contact Tanya Ott at WBHM at Tanya@wbhm.org or by phone at (205) 934-2606.