In 2012 the 5th World Congress on Mental Health and Deafness will open in Monterrey, México. At the closing ceremony of the 4th World Congress, Benito Estrada Arada, who had presented the paper, "Mental Health and Deafness—Evaluation and psychological intervention of Mexican Deaf people", accepted the responsibility to convene the next congress.

Benito lectures at Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, and this will be the venue for the congress.

The 2012 congress website can be found here: http://www.mhd2012mexico.com

Her Excellency Ms Quentin Bryce AC
Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia

Here is a summary of our fantastic Key Note Speakers.

Margaret du Feu - Ireland

Margaret du Feu qualified in medicine in Cambridge and London. She started training in psychiatry after the birth of her daughter, Frances in 1983. In 1991 she was appointed in Birmingham to develop the third service in England (after Manchester and London) for Mental Health and Deafness. In 2003 she started working half the week in Northern Ireland and in 2005 left Birmingham to include the Republic of Ireland in her work. She now lives in Belfast.

Margaret has been progressively deafened by cochlear otosclerosis and is now profoundly Deaf. She had a cochlear implant in 1999. She works in British Sign Language and is learning Irish Sign Language. Her daughter is now a final year medical student. Frances is learning to sign and has written Deaf awareness material for medical students.

Margaret believes that the experiences of patients should benefit others so that the cycle of early deprivation and later mental distress can be broken. Therefore, although she has collaborated in academic research on schizophrenia in Deaf people, her main focus is on increasing awareness of mental health issues for Deaf people, and on teaching mental health professionals about Deafness. She has been involved in preparing teaching material in writing and on DVDs and lectures widely. Her article “Sensory Impairment & Mental Health” was commissioned for Advances in Psychiatric Treatment (2003) Vol.9, 95-103 by the UK Royal College of Psychiatrists.

Robert Pollard Ph.D - USA

Robert Pollard, Ph.D., is a Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester School of Medicine.  He is director of the Deaf Wellness Center (DWC), home to numerous clinical service, training, and research initiatives.  The DWC provides individual, family, and group psychotherapy and evaluation services and is a clinical and research training site for deaf individuals pursuing careers in the mental health fields.  Dr. Pollard is known for his scholarship on mental illness epidemiology and manifestations in the deaf population, psychological testing, research ethics, pre-operative evaluations of cochlear implant candidates, interpreting in mental health settings, and the history of the deaf mental health field.  He is co-developer of the demand control schema for interpreting work and has authored many publications on this topic.  His most recent work has focused on occupational health in the interpreting field, health disparities in the deaf population, adaptation of health education materials for deaf audiences, and partner violence affecting deaf people.  He has been principal investigator on over 30 federal, foundation, regional, and local grants totaling ~$4M and has published over 70 articles and book chapters.  He also has produced 13 educational films in American Sign Language.  Dr. Pollard’s work has been recognized with many awards and honors.  He is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences and is active in several organizations, especially the American Psychological Association, where he founded a Special Interest Section on Deafness.

Ines Sleeboom-van Raaij - Netherlands

Dr. Andrew Cornes - United Kingdom/Australia

Andy began working with the Deaf community in 1988 and has since acted in many roles such as sign language interpreter, social worker, advocate, researcher, lecturer, trainer, consultant and mental health clinician in England and Australia.

His main interest is in creating culturally appropriate ways of assessing and treating signing deaf children with psychological problems and ensuring mental health services are accessible to them.

He has presented widely and published in the small - but developing - subject literature and his PhD (awarded by University of Sydney  - Discipline of Psychological Medicine, Faculty of Medicine) was the first Australian prevalence study into the emotional and behavioural problems of deaf children and adolescents. For this research he developed psychiatric screening instruments in Australian Sign Language (Auslan) in interactive CD-ROM format for clinical use with signing deaf children. This research was granted a national award by the Australian Rotary Health Research Fund who recognised it as an ‘innovative project.’

Andy’s other main interest is training and supervising therapists and sign language interpreters to work more effectively together. Andy has co-developed curricula and training programmes and published in this area.

Andy is a registered family and systemic psychotherapist and chartered psychologist. He is currently employed as a Clinical Manager in Child and Adolescent Mental Health (CAMHS) by the Alder Hey, one of Europe’s biggest specialist paediatric hospitals. The main focus of his work is the assessment and treatment of children and adolescents with emotional and behavioural problems in schools. In addition , he has the lead for assessing and treating deaf children, adolescents and CODAS who are referred to CAMHS.

Separate to his work with the deaf, Andy won the Alder Hey Hospital People’s Choice Award 2009 for work he has done with youngsters who are involved in gangs in the disadvantaged areas of Croxteth and Norris Green in Liverpool (see http://www.alderhey.com/RLCH/assets/Alder%20Hey%20APRIL.pdf ).

Yasmin Kovic - United Kingdom

Yasmin is a deaf social worker with 15 years post qualification experience, including working in a residential setting for deaf adults and young people with mental health problems and learning difficulties and with students in a college for deaf people.  For five years, she was employed by the London Borough of Newham as a Social Worker with Deaf Children and Their Families/Carers, where she undertook both family support work and child protection work.
 
In 2003 Yasmin joined the NSPCC where she developed and delivered a safety skills programme with groups of deaf children.  At this time she also undertook freelance consultant Social Work with Deaf Children and their Families/Carers – specifically in complex child protection cases.

Yasmin moved to the NSPCC, Young Peoples Centre in 2005, where she supported young people using, one to one work, a variety of different group work programmes, drop-in sessions and young people’s participation.  She also continued her safeguarding work with deaf children and during that time established a service for deaf children and young people.  Yasmin has been working since 2007 as the National Safeguarding Advisor for Deaf Children and Young People, where her role was to promote the safeguarding of all deaf children in the UK. In April 2009 this post was upgraded to a Senior Consultant and Yasmin continues to do the safeguarding deaf children work plus additional commissioned external work. She will continue in this role running three national groups: the Safeguarding Deaf Children Interagency group, the Social Workers with Deaf Children group and the ‘Stop It Now’ deaf sex offenders group.

Yasmin has recently finished her training as a Play Therapist (BAPT) specialising specifically in working with deaf children and is the final year of her MA. Yasmin is also a trustee for the organisation ‘Deaf Parenting UK’.

Recent articles on deaf, hearing impairment and mental health or related news stories;

Group helping hearing-impaired students left stranded at oasis
Chicago Tribune - Chicago, IL, USA
"It really is unfortunate," said Stromek, a deaf and hard-of-hearing ... or hard of hearing and exhibit behavioral, emotional or mental health challenges. ...

Deaf man's hope for depression to end
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia
FOR seven decades Colin Hughes has been struggling to keep up with conversations swirling around him....depression plagues his days because he cannot participate fully in family life...

Traumatised Children Struggle to Rise Again
Inter Press Service, Rome Italy
The children, accompanied by mental health professionals, ... arrange a number of activities for children at Gaza's Atfaluna Society for Deaf Children. ...

Sh100m to promote rights of pwds
New Vision - Kampala, Uganda
“Persons with mental health problems are often subjected to inhuman treatment. The deaf and the blind are not provided for at all beyond their families and ...

Youth Call to Action
beyondblue - Australia
The new site kicked off with an advertising campaign aiming to raise the awareness of:

• the signs and symptoms of depression and anxiety in young people
• where to get help

The site also targets not only young people, but their friends,
parents and families.

The Deaf Children, Young People And Family Service
The Press in York - York, North Yorkshire, UK
“One in four of us will experience a mental health problem in our lifetime and for deaf children and young people, these problems can present greater ...

Chat with Dan Gottlieb
Blinq - Philadelphia, PA, USA
Dan will be joined by two guests today, both are mental health professionals. The chat will be about the mental health of people who are deaf or hard of ...

beyondblue and Vicdeaf have produced the fact sheet "Depression in People who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing" and Deaf Children Australia have recognised this important work by endorsing the factsheet.

As a key sponsor of the Congress, beyondblue is committed to well being of deaf and hard of hearing peopole and in producing material appropriate about depression and anxiety for them and the clients who work with them. Vicdeaf is also represented on our National Reference Group for the 4th World Congress on Mental Health and Deafness in Brisbane.