Youth Wellness Day at Sabathani Centers Young People in a Day of Healing, Connection, and Practical Support | MinneapoliMedia Youth Wellness Day at Sabathani offers free, immersive sessions for ages 14–24, focusing on mental health, connection, and practical support in South Minneapolis.

At Sabathani, Youth Wellness Day brings young people together for healing, connection, and real tools to navigate stress, mental health, and daily life challenges.
Full story: minneapolimedia.town.news/g/coon-rapid...

#MinneapoliMedia #YouthWellness #MentalHealth #Community #MinnesotaNews

The Youth Empowerment Initiative supports youth with coping skills, conflict resolution, and leadership development—giving families added support in raising resilient young people.

#SoundingTheAlarm #YouthWellness #FailsafeERA #MentalHealthAwareness #ParentFocused #ResilientYouth #CommunityCare

House backs statewide daily physical-activity requirement after narrow procedural votes The House adopted a committee substitute to H.B. 27-48 requiring daily physical activity for K–12 students (60 minutes average) after an amendment clarified implementation timing and allowed up to 10 minutes to count toward class minutes; members debated logistics, teacher capacity and scheduling impacts.

Missouri's House just passed a bill mandating 60 minutes of daily physical activity for students, but the implementation raises plenty of questions and concerns!

Read the full story

#MO #CitizenPortal #PublicHealth #EducationReform #YouthWellness #MissouriStudents

Did you know your gut is your “second brain”? This Mental Health Month, we’re looking at the fuel behind the focus. Small change, big impact. What’s one healthy snack you’re reaching for today? 
 #LumiWise #MentalHealthMonth #BrainFood #YouthWellness #CanadaMentalHealth

A Program to Improve HIV Outcomes Among Young Adults | The Y2TEC Study

y2tec.ucsf.edu - Y2TEC addresses mental health, substance use, and more.

Help young adults access the care they need with this evidence-based intervention.

#HealthEquity #YouthWellness

Our findings highlight the promise of digital health and mindfulness-based interventions in reducing suicidal thoughts and behaviors among youth with externalizing problems. #MentalHealth #YouthWellness #YouthMentalHealth #SuicidePrevention #DigitalHealth #Mindfulness
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Safe cycling starts at school!
We’re proud of our Strategic alliance with Ever Active. They work alongside schools to make walking and wheeling to school a safe, realistic choice for families. A healthier, greener AB for the next generation!
#EverActive #SafeCycling #Sustainability #YouthWellness

Irregular sleep schedules are associated with altered brain structure in youth Many teenagers sleep in on weekends to catch up on rest. New research associates this irregular schedule with differences in the physical structure and internal communication of the developing brain, which may relate to cognitive growth.

Irregular sleep schedules are associated with altered brain structure in youth #Science #HealthandMedicine #Neurology #SleepHealth #BrainDevelopment #YouthWellness

www.psypost.org/irregular-sleep-schedule...

Teens who regularly drink large amounts of sugar-sweetened beverages — including soda, energy drinks, sweetened teas and coffee drinks — are more likely to report symptoms of anxiety.

youtu.be/vIoGjeCbkTA

#TeenMentalHealth #SugaryDrinks #AdolescentAnxiety #YouthWellness #HealthyTeens

Stability and support help youth facing housing challenges build resilience and safer futures. 💙
🔗 vaccinationrewards.org

#YouthStability #YouthWellness

Youth-led "wellness zone" proposed in Spokane to address anxiety among young people At a Spokane community meeting, an unidentified speaker described rising anxiety among local youth and proposed a youth-led "youth wellness zone," saying a grant will provide concrete resources to support schools and neighborhood efforts.

A groundbreaking proposal for a youth-led "wellness zone" in Spokane aims to empower young voices in tackling rising anxiety and defining their own paths to mental health support.

Click to read more!

#SpokaneSpokaneCounty #WA #SpokaneYoungPeople #YouthWellness #CommunityLeadership #CitizenPortal

Students lead youth wellness pilot at OnTrack Academy; organizers cite grant support Organizers said a student-designed 'youth wellness zone' launched at OnTrack Academy in Northeast Spokane to address anxiety and economic insecurity; students used a 500-response survey to shape programs including food distributions, a planted forest and suicide-prevention outreach. Grant amount not specified.

A groundbreaking "youth wellness zone" at OnTrack Academy empowers Spokane students to combat anxiety and economic insecurity by designing their own wellness programs.

Learn more here

#SpokaneSpokaneCounty #WA #StudentEmpowerment #EconomicInsecurity #SpokaneStudents #YouthWellness #CitizenPortal

Early Evaluation of IMAGINATOR 2.0 Intervention Targeting Self-Harm in Young People: Single-Arm #feasibility Trial Background: Self-harm (SH) affects around 20% of all young people in the United Kingdom. Treatment options for SH remain limited and those available are long and costly and may not suit all young people. There is an urgent need to develop new scalable interventions to address this gap. IMAGINATOR is a novel imagery-based intervention targeting SH initially developed for individuals aged 16 to 25 years. It is a blended digital intervention delivering functional imagery training via therapy sessions and a smartphone app. Objective: This study aimed to pilot a new version of the app, IMAGINATOR 2.0, extended to adolescents from the age of 12 years and coproduced with a diverse group of young people with lived experience. Our aim was also to test the #feasibility and acceptability of delivering IMAGINATOR 2.0 in secondary mental health services. Methods: A total of 4 co-design workshops were conducted online with UK-based lived-experience co-designers aged 14-25 years to develop the IMAGINATOR 2.0 app. The intervention was then piloted with participants recruited from West London NHS Trust Tier 2 Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services and adult Mental Health Integrated Network Teams. Participants received 3 face-to-face functional imagery training sessions in which the app was introduced and 5 brief phone support sessions. Outcome assessments were conducted after completing therapy, approximately 3 months post baseline. Two focus groups gathered the therapists’ perspectives on IMAGINATOR 2.0’s acceptability and means of improvement. For quantitative data, descriptives are reported. Qualitative data were analyzed using a coproduced thematic analysis method with young people with lived experiences. Results: Overall, 83 participants were referred, and 29 (gender: n=28 women, n=1 transgender; mean age 18.9, SD 3.74 years) were eligible and completed screening. Of the 27 participants who started, 59% (n=16) completed therapy per protocol, while only 15 (55.6%) completed the quantitative outcome assessment. There was an overall reduction in the number of SH episodes over 3 months from pre- to postintervention (baseline: median 7, IQR 3.5-21.5 months; postintervention: median 0, IQR 0-7 months; median difference=–6.5; r=0.69). Six themes were identified through thematic analysis of therapists’ feedback, including mental imagery’s potential and boundaries, therapy expectations, experience and effectiveness, accessibility of digital support, and adaptation of the IMAGINATOR 2.0 app to complement care pathways. The app was valued by therapists who highlighted the need for an intervention like IMAGINATOR 2.0 in their services. Conclusions: IMAGINATOR 2.0 shows initial promise as an acceptable brief intervention targeting SH in young people under adolescent and adult mental health services. Challenges with attrition need to be addressed for a definitive randomized controlled trial to test the intervention efficacy. Clinical Trial: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT06311084; https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT06311084

JMIR Formative Res: Early Evaluation of IMAGINATOR 2.0 Intervention Targeting Self-Harm in Young People: Single-Arm #feasibility Trial #SelfHarm #MentalHealth #YouthWellness #DigitalIntervention #ImageryTraining

Triaging Casual From Critical—Leveraging Machine Learning to Detect Self-Harm and Suicide Risks for Youth on #SocialMedia #SoMe #hcsm: Algorithm Development and Validation Study Background: This study aims to detect self-harm or suicide (SH-S) ideation language used by youth (aged 13-21 y) in their private Instagram (Meta) conversations. While automated #MentalHealth tools have shown promise, there remains a gap in understanding how nuanced youth language around SH-S can be effectively identified. Objective: Our work aimed to develop interpretable models that go beyond binary classification to recognize the spectrum of SH-S expressions. Methods: We analyzed a dataset of Instagram private conversations donated by youth. A range of traditional machine learning models (support vector machine, random forest, Naive Bayes, and extreme gradient boosting) and transformer-based architectures (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers and Distilled Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) were trained and evaluated. In addition to raw text, we incorporated contextual, psycholinguistic (linguistic injury word count), sentiment (Valence Aware Dictionary and Sentiment Reasoner), and lexical (term frequency–inverse document frequency) features to improve detection accuracy. We further explored how increasing conversational context—from message-level to subconversation level—affected model performance. Results: Distilled Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers demonstrated a good performance in identifying the presence of SH-S behaviors within individual messages, achieving an accuracy of 99%. However, when tasked with a more fine-grained classification—differentiating among “self” (personal accounts of SH-S), “other” (references to SH-S experiences involving others), and “hyperbole” (sarcastic, humorous, or exaggerated mentions not indicative of genuine risk)—the model’s accuracy declined to 89%. Notably, by expanding the input window to include a broader conversational context, the model’s performance on these granular categories improved to 91%, highlighting the importance of contextual understanding when distinguishing between subtle variations in SH-S discourse. Conclusions: Our findings underscore the importance of designing SH-S automatic detection systems sensitive to the dynamic language of youth and #SocialMedia #SoMe #hcsm. Contextual and sentiment-aware models improve detection and provide a nuanced understanding of SH-S risk expression. This research lays the foundation for developing inclusive and ethically grounded interventions, while also calling for future work to validate these models across platforms and populations.

JMIR Mental Health: Triaging Casual From Critical—Leveraging Machine Learning to Detect Self-Harm and Suicide Risks for Youth on #SocialMedia #SoMe #hcsm: Algorithm Development and Validation Study #MentalHealth #YouthWellness #SocialMediaSafety #SuicidePrevention #MachineLearning

Teen girls carry a lot—even when it doesn’t show. Academic pressure, comparison, and identity can feel heavy. Listening, open conversations, and teaching healthy coping skills matter. 💙 Thanks @parentingteensandtweens for the reminder. #TeenHealthTuesday #YouthWellness

Inclusive Sex Education: Why Representation Saves Lives Inclusive, age-appropriate sex education improves health literacy, reduces risk, and supports LGBTQ+ youth by teaching real-world, affirming information.

📚🌈 Inclusive sex education isn’t about politics. Read this deep dive on why inclusive...

Article link: afterdarktreasures.com/blogs/everyt...

#InclusiveSexEd #LGBTQYouth #HealthLiteracy #SexPositiveEducation #ConsentCulture #STIPrevention #YouthWellness #EndTheStigma #QueerEducation #LGBTQIA #Gay

Small moments of connection can make a meaningful difference in a child’s mental health journey. #childpsychiatry #mentalhealthmatters #youthwellness #telehealthcare #healingthroughwords #physicianreflections #mentalhealthsupport #teenwellness #telehealthstories #childmentalhealth #youthsupport

As a parent and caregiver, Stacey has seen Foundry’s services help young people talk openly about mental health and find support.

Watch her story: foundrybc.ca/10-years/

#Foundry10Years #YouthWellness

Holly Hebert, BS, RDH, studied teen behavior change for healthier habits. She blends clinical care with creativity & compassion. ohupublishing.com ohehiruniversity.org #OHUGrad #YouthWellness #DentalHygiene #degreecompletion #onlinedegree #SDG3 #SDG4 #dentalhygienist #ISSN #onlinemasters #postgrad

The Role of Practitioner- and User-Set Goals in Engagement and Psychological Distress Among Kooth Digital Health Users: Retrospective Analysis Background: Youth and young adult mental health concerns are rising globally, with digital mental health platforms offering a promising solution for accessible support. Among the various features these platforms provide, goal setting and achievement have been shown to positively influence behavior change and mental health outcomes. However, there is limited understanding of how user-set goals compare to those set collaboratively with a practitioner regarding their impact on user engagement and mental health outcomes in digital mental health platforms. Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between various goal-related variables (eg, the number of goals created and progress in user-set and practitioner-set goals) and user engagement as well as mental health (ie, psychological distress) on a free digital mental health platform. A secondary exploratory aim was to assess how different user-presenting issues were associated with platform engagement. Methods: We leveraged secondary data from a free, web-based mental health platform for youth aged 10 to 25 years in the United Kingdom that offers goal-setting features, emotional journaling, peer support, asynchronous chat with practitioners, and various self-guided well-being activities. Data included in the analyses were from youth and young adults (mean age 15.84 years, SD 2.88; 522/691, 75.5% female) who engaged with the goal-setting feature and completed both pre- and postengagement psychological distress measures between January 2020 and December 2023. We examined the relationship between user-set goals and practitioner-set goals on user engagement and psychological distress via linear regressions. The impact of different user-presenting issues on engagement was also explored via linear regression. Results: The number of practitioner-set goals created was positively associated with platform engagement (β=.16; P

JMIR Formative Res: The Role of Practitioner- and User-Set Goals in Engagement and Psychological Distress Among Kooth Digital Health Users: Retrospective Analysis #MentalHealth #DigitalHealth #YouthWellness #GoalSetting #MentalHealthMatters

Pre-workout supplements linked to dangerously short sleep in young people Adolescents and young adults who consume pre-workout dietary supplements may be sacrificing essential rest for their fitness goals. A recent analysis indicates that individuals in this age group who use...

Pre-workout supplements linked to dangerously short sleep in young people #Science #HealthandMedicine #PublicHealth #SleepHealth #PreWorkoutSupplements #YouthWellness

Last week we brought "nourish" to South Huron District High School!✨

Thanks to SHDHS for welcoming us & to our supporters Bell Let’s Talk & DOSE Juice Co. for making this program possible💚

#nourish #SouthwesternOntario #youth #youthwellness #wellness #mindfulness #Huron #MentalHealth #BellLetsTalk

🍂Happy Thanksgiving from Henrico Too Smart 2 Start!🍂 Grateful for our community—parents, caregivers, educators, and youth. Have a warm, gratitude-filled day!

#Thanksgiving #TooSmart2Start #ItTakesAVillage #YouthWellness #FamilyTime #PreventionMatters #GratitudeSeason

Sorrel Leaf Healing Center Awarded $100,000 PG&E Grant for Cultural Land Stewardship and Youth Wellness PG&E’s foundation is giving $500,000 to five California organizations, including $100,000 to Eureka’s Sorrel Leaf Healing Center to support cultural burns, native restoration, and land-based healing…

Sorrel Leaf Healing Center Awarded $100,000 PG&E Grant for Cultural Land Stewardship and Youth Wellness #PGE #SorrelLeafHealingCenter #HumboldtCounty #YouthWellness #CulturalBurns #BackAcres

If you know someone in #Oakland, ages 13-26 in need of free services, send them this! 🙌🏾

At our Young People's Wellness Center, we're all about supporting our young community members with a wide variety of services, from medical to mental health!

#RootsEmpowers #YouthWellness #YouthSupport

Clinician Perspectives on Incorporating Physical Activity and Sleep Prescriptions Using eHealth for Youth With Comorbid Psychiatric Disorders: Qualitative Focus Group Study Background: Physical activity and sleep prescriptions are indicated for the treatment of psychiatric disorders among youth. However, there is limited clinical adoption of these practices. Exergaming (ie, games that require physical activity) is a feasible intervention to promote physical activity and sleep hygiene and is appealing to youth given their interest in video gaming. Integrating exergaming prescriptions into clinical mental health practices may offer an opportunity to expand access to these interventions, yet pragmatic considerations for adopting these programs are poorly understood. Objective: This study aimed to gain feedback from practicing clinicians on adopting GamerFit, an app-based intervention that incorporates exergames, step and sleep tracking, and online coaching to promote physical activity and sleep, as a tool in treatment plans for youth aged 13 to 17 years with psychiatric disorders. Methods: Mental health clinicians participated in 2 online focus groups. A semistructured interview collected information on perceptions of the importance of physical activity and sleep, considerations for using GamerFit with clients, and approaches for incorporating GamerFit into standard care. Qualitative analysis included a hierarchical thematic coding system of isolated quotes, with the structure, frequency, and interrelationships of the coded quotes used for analysis. Results: All clinicians (8/8, 100%) endorsed physical activity and sleep prescriptions as important interventions, although they were not typically a focus of treatment. Clinicians reported varying levels of self-efficacy in encouraging physical activity goals (6/8, 75%) and, to a lesser extent, sleep hygiene (4/8, 50%). Most perceived eHealth approaches positively (7/8, 88%) and noted their appeal given the accessibility of this physical activity option via gaming (2/4, 50%). Clinicians were optimistic about the #feasibility of using GamerFit; the exergame and health coaching aspects of GamerFit were perceived favorably (5/8, 62%). Clinicians desired to access app data in electronic health systems to incorporate in therapeutic sessions (4/8, 50%) and recommended using the app in residential settings with continued use at home (2/8, 25%). Clinicians expressed concern regarding the implementation of GamerFit with families with low technology literacy, noting that some patients would likely require parental assistance to help with reminders and technology use (1/8, 12%). Suggestions for improvement included a greater variety of exergames and features to increase adolescents’ engagement (6/8, 75%). There was a considerable willingness to incorporate this technology into clinicians’ clinical practices and a strong desire for insurance provisions to cover coaching and technological components (7/8, 88%). Conclusions: Clinicians perceived GamerFit as a feasible and acceptable clinical approach to physical activity and sleep prescriptions for youth with psychiatric disorders. The remote delivery of this intervention was perceived to be of interest to patients and provided helpful guidance for clinicians who were short on time to address many important topics within limited session time frames.

JMIR Formative Res: Clinician Perspectives on Incorporating Physical Activity and Sleep Prescriptions Using eHealth for Youth With Comorbid Psychiatric Disorders: Qualitative Focus Group Study #MentalHealth #PhysicalActivity #YouthWellness #eHealth #Exergaming

✨ Meet Jasmine Blue, MPH, a powerful voice at the It Takes A Village event! Join us on Nov 18, 5:30-7:30pm, 15 S Oak Ave, Highland Springs, VA. #MeetThePanelist #ItTakesaVillage #TooSmart2Start #HealthyHenrico #YouthWellness #EndTheStigma #HealthyYouth #Henrico #HenricoVA

Proud to support this meaningful addition of Foundry Burns Lake to the community, an important step toward building a province where young people can grow, heal and thrive. #YouthWellness #MentalHealthMatters

@foundrybc.bsky.social
@spencerch.bsky.social
@jodiewickens.bsky.social

Join us for IT TAKES A VILLAGE! Food, games & conversations on youth substance misuse. 💪

👉 Register Now: https://linktr.ee/henricotoosmart2start

#ItTakesaVillage #TooSmart2Start #healthyhenrico #YouthWellness #EndTheStigma #Henrico #HenricoVA

Community Chat at Castle Rock Middle School Tackles Youth Behavioral Health Issues Local leaders discuss solutions for youth mental wellness and funding training for PCPs.

Castle Rock is taking a stand on youth mental health, proposing vital training for local doctors to combat rising childhood depression rates.

Learn more here

#CastleRockDouglasCounty #CO #CitizenPortal #PublicSafety #MentalHealth #YouthWellness