In recent years, School 145 in New York City has significantly bolstered its mental health counseling services, with the help of the nonprofit Counseling in Schools, and test scores are starting to improve. "I have 52 students whose parents have given me letters saying 'in case I get deported, this is where my child is going.'" the principal explained, emphasizing the importance of providing mental health care resources at school. "And then we have to talk about college and career readiness."

DIY solutions can overcome the scarcity of medical resources in developing countries and save lives. A simple solution such as replacing expensive uterine balloons with more readily accessible condoms has already helped to give thousands of mothers access to a potentially life-saving medical procedure preventing postpartum hemorrhage. The transfer of this and other proven DIY solutions can help cut health-care costs in more affluent countries with low-cost innovations.

When a medical student identified a lack of education and materials provided to her class that focused on LGBT information and resources, she and her classmates decided to confront the school administration about the curriculum. The conversation spurred action that resulted in increased trainings and teachings that has in turn led to a better likelihood of proper diagnosis for this community.

In Philadelphia, a program based on a similar initiative in Cleveland is on its way to success. PAGE (Philadelphia Anchors for Growth & Equity) will direct spending from large institutions locally. Specifically, it will work with anchor institutions like the universities in town and fill gaps, like building a laundry facility that will create jobs and fill the need by places like Jefferson Health and Penn Medicine. Job creation is what will keep this organization and the city of Philadelphia going.

Suicidologist James Motto discovered through extensive research that persistent contact with patients reduced their likelihood to repeat suicide attempts. He wrote letters to patients over up to 15 years and found that even people who did not want to be reached responded to the treatment. Patients who received letters were half as likely as the control group to commit suicide. In recent years, some psychiatrists have made this method more personal and begun sending texts to patients.

The Red Tide that hit the coast of Florida in 2018 resulted in a massive amount of waste and dead sea species washing ashore. With no protocol in place to clean up the toxic mess, counties had to learn while doing. From failures to successes, the state is now better equipped to mobilize should a similar event happen in the future.

Scoop and Run is a police practice that has saved lives. During a “scoop and run” police take gunshot or stab wound victims to the emergency room instead of waiting for an ambulance. Philadelphia is the only city, among cities with high rates of homicides, that has implemented “scoop and run” into policy. "Last year, a third of Philadelphia’s 1,223 shooting victims were delivered to a city trauma center.”

Faculty and staff at Philadelphia’s LaSalle University are being given crisis training to recognize, engage, and refer students with suicide ideation. With the number of students seeking mental health care increasing, this program expands the safety net of people students can reach out to in a time of need.

Cahoots, or Crisis Assistance Helping Out On The Streets, is a non-profit group that responds to mental health emergency calls instead of police in Eugene, Oregon. The group is cheaper than sending first responders, but are wired in to the 911 system and can respond without law enforcement. In neighboring Olympia, police are setting up a group modeled on Cahoots.

Close collaboration between stakeholders in a community allows rural health centers to remain in operation. With the failure of many rural hospitals across the United States, medical providers, nonprofit organizations, and even city governments are coming together to invest and save institutions crucial to their communities. From placing faltering hospitals under municipal control, to expanding services through nonprofit donations, many rural communities are finding solutions that fit.

A lack of access to basic personal hygiene necessities will hinder anyone's everyday life, but it especially impacts children that have to attend school where they are often bullied because of it. To provide these children with a better educational environment, teachers are implementing "hygiene closets" that are stocked with items such as soap, deodorant, toothpaste, toothbrushes, and tampons.

Adverse childhood experiences such as physical or substance abuse, parental divorce and emotional neglect can often negatively impact children's behavior at school. Recognizing this, some schools have started implementing alternatives to punishment that focus on addressing this trauma on-site rather than sending the children home.

Bringing nutrition and diet under the purview of a patient’s medical care helps reduce lifetime healthcare risks and costs. The Fresh Food Farmacy, part of the Geisinger Health System in Northumberland County, Pennsylvania, helps provide patients who are food-insecure with access to healthy foods alongside healthcare support and sessions with nutritionists. By discussing diet in terms of doses and investing in preventative care, the program aims to help patients understand food as part of their overall wellbeing.

Technology is being used in the medical industry to bridge gaps often created by health insurance companies' reliance on reactive rather than proactive care. From hearing loss to family planning, entrepreneurs are finding success in "walking the line between medical firm and tech start-up."

Philadelphia could benefit from Connecticut’s Child FIRST program. The company sends therapists to family homes to help them address their mental health situations using Child-Parent Psychotherapy (CPP). Child FIRST gets federal funding and has been recognized as "evidence based" treatment by the Department of Health and Human Services.

After providing emotional support to peers who were struggling with suicidal thoughts, a college student in Philadelphia created a Twitter group "to prevent suicide and raise awareness for mental health." Although not a replacement for professional help, the Buddy Project has provided support for 230,000 people worldwide and raised $36,000 for mental health and recovery centers.

Accessing preventative health care, such as routine mammograms, is often dictated by socioeconomic levels and geographical boundaries. To change this, an engineer sought out technology and partnerships that eventually lead to the creation of iBreastExam, an affordable and mobile way to conduct a breast exam that is being used in 12 countries and has screened 250,000 women.

Libraries across the United States are expanding what they offer to not just include books, but also a host of social and human services. From stocking an anti-overdose drug to offering mental health services and legal support, libraries are preparing to serve anyone that may walk through the door.

Providing door-to-door health care for mothers and children under five years of age greatly reduces mortality. Thanks to a program of home visits by community health care workers funded by the Clinton Health Access Initiative, the Yirimadio neighborhood of Mali’s capital city, Bamako, has succeeded in dramatically reducing childhood mortality. The government intends to scale the pilot program into a nationwide campaign by 2022.

In Washington, state legislators have passed an innovative measure that would allow individuals to suspend their own gun rights. The bill was started as a proactive measure for those experience mental health issues to be able to prevent themselves from harming themselves in the future. While they’re still working on publicizing the new measure, those that do know about it simply have to fill out a short form at any count clerk’s office – the rest is taken care of within 24 hours.

For many, group prenatal visits allow pregnant people to chat about their issues in a non-judgemental space and get the care they need. CenteringPregnancy groups are spreading across the country, and they have also been shown to save money while reducing the rates of premature births.

A copywriting student at Miami Ad School developed small, stylish buttons depicting different commonly taken medications to encourage conversations around mental illness and to destigmatize mental health issues. The "Wear Your Meds" buttons allow people to be open and explicit.

Abortion is often stigmatized, but women across the United States are finding that speaking out about their experiences is impacting the conversation in very tangible ways. From peer mentoring to changing the platforms of politicians, the women participating in the national movement is to change the conversation and enact policy change.

After 11 months of calls to employment lawyers and civil rights groups, legal proceedings, and recommended reforms to current legislation, seven women of the Sexual Harassment Working Group, all of whom are survivors, have successfully forced the New York's lawmakers to hold the first public hearing on sexual harassment since 1992. The members of the working group see the hearing as an important first step in reckoning with Albany's checkered past.

Almost a quarter of rural Americans surveyed by NPR had used a telehealth service in the past few years. While new technologies are allowing remote patients to gain new access to healthcare, lack of broadband service and outdated insurance policies are making it hard for more widespread adoption.

Keeping families together eases the burden on the foster care system and reduces issues such as homelessness and substance abuse in the long term. Former foster children in Spokane, Washington, end up relying heavily upon other social welfare institutions throughout their lives. To break this cycle, Rising Strong, a program funded largely by a philanthropic contribution, focuses on rebuilding families while addressing behavior issues through an intensive, live-in program.

Stockton, California is known as one of the most dangerous cities in the state, making the police department one of the most overburdened departments as well. That hasn't deterred the department from taking steps to change police culture by implementing programs such as a wellness network that aims to reduce officer PTSD.

A smartphone app connects users with sex experts who are qualified to answer questions about healthy sex and relationships. Juicebox aims to fill gaps in the heteronormative sex education offered in U.S. schools and serves as a substitute for students who receive no sex education or who are only exposed to abstinence-only lessons.

Day reporting, which serves as an alternative to to jail or prison for many with substance abuse disorders, provides intense, holistic programming to help participants recover. The personal relationships built in the programs are particularly helpful according to participants, although relatively little formal research has been conducted about the approach.

In Wyoming, volunteers are given health care trainings to help them as caregivers to those with chronic illnesses who are too far away from a doctor to receive adequate care. That curriculum, along with support groups, is helping those in rural communities practice chronic disease self management to improve quality of life.

CVS is expanding their coverage from beyond just selling medical supplies to also offering on-site medical assessments as well as nutrition and wellness classes to address a growing population of people that don't have a primary care doctor. “We refer to this care concierge as the Geek Squad for healthcare,” jokes Kevin Hourican, president of CVS Pharmacy.

There are many factors that prohibit people from being able to attend mental health counseling including financial reasoning and difficulty finding the right therapist. This is often even more difficult for the LGBTQ community, but in Philadelphia, the LGBTQ-focused Walnut Psychotherapy Center is helping to eliminate some of these barriers by creating a wellness fund that distributes therapy scholarships.

When a group of middle school girls got tired of having their periods treated as a stigmatized issue, they decided to start their own podcast in order to educate their peers and start a conversation around this natural process. "When I heard we were gonna talk about periods, at first I was disgusted and uncomfortable because that's just how I am," says Kassy Abad. "But once we got to talk about it, and I learned that what happens to me happens to all these other girls, it made me feel more comfortable. It made me feel safe."

Making reproductive health care a part of a woman’s primary care expands opportunities for proactive family planning. Delaware nonprofit, Upstream, partners with health care systems to increase access to information and contraceptive options. Upstream provides training sessions in women’s reproductive health care for people working across the health care system. The nonprofit remains independent by sustaining itself through private donations and grants.

Economists have often debated the positives of a higher minimum wage in the United States as a matter of productivity, profits, and losses but in this article, Matthew Desmond explores another way that the success of increasing minimum wage can be measured: through public health and impacts on things like depression, anxiety, stress, and more. Studies have shown that higher minimum wages have been connected to lower rates of teenage alcohol consumption and preventing premature deaths.

Despite many medical advances in obstetrics, there is still little understanding around what causes pre-mature labor and how to successfully stop it. Doctors and researchers in New York City are working to change this, however, by examining women earlier in their pregnancies to better understand the complexities of this issue.

In New York City, much of the mental health infrastructure relies on the work of professionals known as Peer Specialists, who are individuals with lived experiences of mental health challenges and additional training to help others in a similar situation. Peer Specialists have recently been organizing around issues such as low pay and a lack of legitimacy in the eyes of their colleagues in the mental health industry.

Riverside Correction Facility in Philadelphia has implemented a program that allows incarcerated new mothers the opportunity to both learn about the benefits of maintaining breast milk supply, and also provide it for their newborns. The lactation program not only carries significant health benefits for the infant and mother, but also encourages crucial bonding between the two.

In the United States, parental leave is set at 12 weeks, but many companies have begun pursuing other possibilities such as paid time and more time for both mothers and fathers. Most recently, however, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has decreased their parental leave from one year to six months while adding in a financial stipend based of what they've learned from past failures.

In Camden, New Jersey, 40 percent of the population 5 years or older speaks Spanish at home. However, only 5 percent of graduates from medical schools in the state identify as Hispanic or Latino. In an effort to shift these statistics and provide better care to the city's Spanish-speaking residents, Rutgers University requires undergraduates interested in health professions to take language classes and practice Spanish in a medical context.

An Army veteran who served in Iraq saw that post traumatic Stress disorder afflicted too many of his peers. He started a mental health technology company that tracks health data from heart rate to exercise to time spent meditating or journaling. The app can signal to users when they should check in with professionals. The business is attracting funding and partnerships.

Founded in 2000, Hopeworks provides coding and computer training combined with connections to internship and job opportunities to youth in Camden. The larger aim of the organization is to cultivate "'a positive, healing atmosphere' capable of helping participants break the cycle of poverty and violence."

To combat emotional distress that many students are facing, schools across the nation are implementing mock funerals, allowing students to figuratively "bury their pain." Although issues at focus range from drunk driving, to poor test scores to peer violence, the overarching goal is to make sure that students feel that they're being heard by the adults that surround them.

House calls are not new to the medicine field, but they are becoming more predominant as doctors look for ways to expand access to those that aren't able to make it into an office. Focusing mostly on "disabled, chronically ill, elderly, and other at-risk populations," doctors are utilizing technological advancements to bring the care to the patient, a practice that also allows them a chance to assess their home situation.

The African American community is disproportionately impacted by high blood pressure, but barbershops across Los Angeles County are stepping up to fill a gap between diagnosis and care. The businesses offer a detection and management program to that includes checking patrons blood pressure as well as connecting the client with an on-site pharmacist.

After gaining attention in 2008 for having an obesity crisis, the city of Huntington, West Virginia started making slow and steady changes that have culminated into positive changes in the community's overall health. From a food market that gives back to the farmers and artisans that contribute to it to school cafeteria reform, the city has seen their obesity rate decrease and has shifted to a collective healthier mindset overall.

Art encourages resilience by helping kids in difficult neighborhoods cope with trauma. In the neighborhood of Fairhill, in Philadelphia, Taller Tuertorriqueño, a community arts center, offers art workshops and programs that emphasize the community’s connection to Puerto Rican culture. By supporting and bringing resources to the community, Taller Tuertorriqueño helps youth express themselves and manage the stress of their environment.

The United States Postal Service has launched a drone delivery service that has the potential to save lives due to the time it cuts down on providing medical supplies. Currently, the service is only transporting blood and other medical supplies between buildings at WakeMed Raleigh’s medical campus, but has the potential to scale up in the future.

Across the United States, overwhelmed emergency rooms constantly struggle to accommodate those that are having psychiatric health issues due to methods of necessary prioritization. To combat this issue, a handful of hospitals throughout the nation have opened specialty ERs that are specifically designated for those in psychiatric crises.

Cities that invest in multi-faceted opioid addiction treatment programs succeed in lowering overdose deaths. In Little Falls, Minnesota, the idea of “medication-assisted treatment” includes combining the traditional use of drugs like Suboxone to wean heavy opioid dependency with additional measures, including hospital oversight to reduce excess prescriptions and the coordination of care between social workers, doctors, nurses, teachers, and even law enforcement. Cities with successful public health programs treating opioid addiction rely on federal and state grants as well as donations.