For the past 100 years, scholars have documented the association of serious mental illness with early mortality. Accelerated aging in people with serious mental illness may be a result of the pathophysiology of mental illnesses and/or non-pathophysiological impacts on the body including medication side effects, the stress of psychotic episodes, stress of navigating the mental healthcare system, stigmatization, community exclusion, impact of lack of preventative care, stress of lower functional status, weak social support, poor healthcare, trauma, lower socioeconomic status, and lifestyle factors such as unhealthy diet, sedentary behavior, and smoking. This webinar will present on the latest empirical evidence on both the risk and protective factors against accelerated aging in people with serious mental illness.
Karen Fortuna, PhD, LICSW holds a doctorate in Social Welfare and a master’s degree in Social Work. Dr. Fortuna is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College. Her primary research interest is service delivery strategies for older adults with serious mental illnesses and chronic health conditions. Dr. Fortuna is using community-engaged research methods to develop and implement peer-supported mobile health (mHealth) intervention. She was awarded the NARSAD Young Investigator Grants from the Brain and Behavior Foundation and the Alvin R. Tarlov & John E. Ware Jr. Award in Patient Reported Outcomes for her work. Dr. Fortuna served on the International Standards Advisory Committee to develop the first-ever international accreditation standards for behavioral health care for older adults. Her work can be seen in numerous book chapters on digital peer support, in peer-reviewed journal publications, and in Forbes Magazine and Innovators Magazine. She currently serves as editor of the Journal of Participatory Medicine.
Robert Walker, MS, COAPS is a state peer specialist’s organizer with lived experience with a mental illness. He is on the National and Local Peer Advisory Board for a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute-funded project based at Dartmouth College, organizing the voice of lived experience with behavioral health conditions to influence research and serving as the voice of persons served in the public mental health system to influence public policy, services, and programs. He is employed with the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health.
