Making Mental Health Essential: A Community Health Forum

Eastern Washington University in partnership with Providence Health Care, the Empire Health Foundation, and Kaiser Permanente hosted the “Making Mental Health Essential Health: A Community Health Forum on January 31^st. Over 1300 community members attended the event and had access to community vendors providing resources for mental and behavioral health. The Honorable Patrick J. Kennedy, former member of the U.S. House of representatives shared valuable insight on the mental health future of America. Kennedy is the co-author of A Common Struggle, sharing both his personal story and his innovative visions to address mental health.

Students from the Master of Public Health program assisted on running the event and had the opportunity to network with important community members actively engaging in behavioral and mental health concerns in Spokane Washington. Guillermo Mendez, a second-year student in the Master of Public Health program shared his thoughts on the event: “my main takeaway from his talk [Patrick J. Kennedy] was that mental health can impact people from all backgrounds, despite coming from a powerful family with access to many resources. Patrick shed light on how rampant the mental health crisis is and what we can do as a community to address this issue”.