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Next Gen Prevention

Mental Health America has a long history of advocating for prevention and early intervention. At a time when over 50 million people live with a mental health condition, there is no more important moment for prevention than now. The MHA National Prevention and Screening program continually reminds us of this urgent need and the alarming rise of people experiencing anxiety, depression, psychosis, loneliness, and other mental health concerns. In addition to growing health crises, our country has faced widespread hopelessness, despair, and racial trauma, which have unequally affected Black, Indigenous, people of color, the LGBTQ+, and disability communities, and individuals with multiple marginalized identities.

Approximately 15,000 individuals each day are now coming to MHA to screen themselves for a mental health condition and seek support through our online screening program. Over 70% of these screeners are 24 or younger, and most are scoring at moderate to severe risk for a mental health condition. In addition, over half of youth ages 11-17 say they are thinking about suicide more than half the days of the week. We have a generation in peril who need our immediate attention.

At MHA we support people through the ebb and flow of wellness and illness. For some, the pandemic created new mental health and substance use concerns, for others it exacerbated existing mental health and substance use conditions. The future of mental health holds many new opportunities and technologies, and our conference is a chance to examine these issues more deeply.

Conference Focus

At the 2023 Mental Health America Conference we will focus on:

• Youth and Young Adults: Creating solutions in partnership with young people.
• Social Determinants of Mental Health (SDOMH): Identifying, responding, and understanding the SDOMH and their impact on health equity.
• Continuum of Prevention: Promoting well-being, preventing illness, increasing resilience, and fostering recovery.
• Crisis Response: Responding to mental health crises and deaths of despair, 988 implementations, and new pathways in harm reduction.
• Recovery and Resilience: Promoting the role of peer support, substance use and recovery, the power of lived experience, and storytelling.
• Innovation: Exploring emerging trends in mental health treatment and well-being promotion, including digital mental health support, alternative therapies, the role of the metaverse, spirituality, and more.

Virtual Access

• Virtual access to view live sessions from the Policy Institute, Affiliate Day, and Main Conference sessions
• Access to MHA's premier virtual live-streaming and networking platform
• 30-day online access to view all session recordings