Amelia Callaghan, Patrick McGorry and Cameron Dick will address a studio audience at Brisbane’s ABC headquarters as part of a forum hosted by Matt Wordsworth and Emma Griffiths.
It will be broadcast live on ABC TV from 7:30pm (AEDT) and ABC News 24 from 8:00pm (AEDT), as well as live on 612 ABC Brisbane Digital Radio.
There will also be a live blog on the ABC News website on the night for anyone who wants to follow along and contribute to the discussion.
Here is a bit more about the panellists including what they do and their own experiences with mental health issues.
Amelia Callaghan
Amelia Callaghan is the regional manager for Headspace Meadowbrook, former state manager for Queensland, Northern Territory and Western Australia
Can you remember your first personal experience with the issue of mental health?
I grew up with depression, anxiety and alcohol addiction in my family, so it was there for as long as I can remember.
It was a day to day reality rather than a single event. I didn’t realise it was mental health at the time, and I thought all families were like that until I started high school.
It was only as I got older that I realised that while everyone and every family has their unique challenges, some are more entrenched and harder to change than others, particularly without any external help.
How can we become more comfortable talking about mental illness?
By starting with talking about how we are feeling — the good, the bad and the unusual.
R U OK Day, Mental Health Week, mental health phone apps, health promotion in social media, doing talks in schools; all of these types of activities start to bring mental illness in to the mainstream.
It’s no longer something on the fringes that happens to other people, people we don’t know personally. It educates people that mental illness can happen to anyone and any time, and this education helps make it more socially acceptable to talk about mental health and mental illness.
I think that young people are becoming more comfortable talking about their feelings, and asking for help, although it probably has more of a way to go with our young males in particular.
Having strong male role models like some of our sporting stars but also dads, uncles, teachers and sporting coaches coming out and talking about their mental health and encouraging help seeking is a great start.
What is the next thing you want to achieve with regard to youth mental health?
Create a safe and vibrant headspace centre where young people can come for a variety of reasons, including if they need someone to talk to or some help around their mental health.
I’d like to think it’s a bit like Domino’s … by creating this space, maybe we can give young people a positive experience of the centre and help seeking that will hopefully encourage them to seek help in the future if they need it, or that they will encourage their friends or family to seek help because of the good experience they have had.
The long-term achievement would be reducing suicide in young people, the duration of untreated illness and [the] long-term effects on the quality of their lives.
How do you try to stay in touch with the problems facing under 25s?
I come in contact with young people every day through my work at Headspace Meadowbrook.
Our Youth Reference Group also helps me to keep in touch by providing me with open and frank feedback about the services and the needs of young people in the Logan community.
If there was one thing you could tell your younger self what would it be?
This one is hard … I’m not sure I would say anything — maybe just give them a warm hug.
Professor Patrick McGorry
Professor Patrick McGorry is the executive director of Orygen, Professor of Youth Mental Health at The University of Melbourne and a director of the National Youth Mental Health Foundation.
Can you remember your first personal experience with the issue of mental health?
When I was a medical student and was on a placement at a Sydney psychiatric hospital in the 1970s, I came in contact for the first time with people who were experiencing psychotic illnesses.
How can we become more comfortable talking about mental illness?
It is easy for those problems which shade into the realm of normal human emotional life such as anxiety and depression.
More challenging for those which produce behaviour that is more confronting such as anorexia, borderline interpersonal relationships, self harm, drug or alcohol abuse and psychosis.
[Mental health] needs public education and demonstration that treatments are effective too.
What is the next thing you want to achieve with regard with to youth mental health?
National coverage of every Australian community with headspace centres which have deeper and more expert specialised back up services across the full diagnostic spectrum.
How do you try to stay in touch with the problems facing under 25s?
Working clinically with young people in this age group, having relationships with youth advisors in our service settings and talking with my children and their mid-20s friends.
If there was one thing you could tell your younger self what would it be?
“Don’t grow up…. it’s a trap!”
No seriously. “Have more confidence to challenge the status quo earlier on in your career and try to persuade and seek allies and broader support … but don’t die wondering!”
Cameron Dick
Cameron Dick is the Queensland Minister for Health and Minister for Ambulance Services.
Can you remember your first personal experience with the issue of mental health?
During my time as a barrister, I acted for a number of people with severe depression and various mental health issues. I remember in particular acting for one man battling severe mental health problems.
We were able to successfully ensure that he could safely spend time with this children, due to his commitment to ongoing treatment.
It was a mammoth win for him and his family. I was proud to be involved in that case.
How can we become more comfortable talking about mental illness?
By keeping it in the public spotlight with continuous conversation. It must be a consistent topic of discussion at every level of community and we should be looking for every opportunity to have it.
As government, we should also be doing anything that we can to facilitate this, and to normalise and de-stigmatise mental illness.
What is the next thing you want to achieve with regard to youth mental health?
I want to listen to communities so that in partnership we can develop a contemporary youth mental health service for Queensland to respond to emerging challenges like anxiety and eating disorders.
How do you try to stay in touch with the problems facing under 25s?
In my role I am constantly engaging with young people and supporting some great events designed to help keep them in the right headspace.
Finding the right channels for young people to connect with others and share their thoughts and feelings is important.
Events like last month’s Positive Mindset Creative Arts Festival, held in Logan, are linking young people and challenging them to express themselves in a creative way.
I also fully embrace initiatives like the Noffs Foundation’s Street Universities program, which in addition to conventional clinical treatment for young people with drug and alcohol problems also focuses on positive recreation programs, mentoring and skills development programs.
If there was one thing you could tell your younger self what would it be?
Even though it sounds cliched: “Don’t worry and be happy. Everything works out in the end.”