The Public Health Association of Australia, in Partnership with Beyond Blue present the Preventive Mental Health Symposium to be held on Tuesday 12 March 2024 at the Pullman Albert Park, Melbourne.
The symposium will be held as a hybrid event which will include in-person and online attendance.
The symposium will include a mix of keynote speakers and panel discussions.
Background
Australia’s National Preventive Health Strategy includes a specific focus on promoting and protecting mental health, yet it is not clear how this focus will be implemented. The public health community has an important contribution to make in this endeavour, working in collaboration with stakeholders in mental health and other sectors. It is therefore important to bring these communities together to consider how they can collaborate to promote and protect Australian’s mental wellbeing.
The situation is urgent. The prevalence and impact of mental health conditions continues to rise and the demand for mental healthcare services is exceeding their availability, despite steadily increasing per capita investment in mental healthcare supports and services over three decades. A growing number of evidence-based programs are available to promote people’s mental wellbeing and reduce their risk of experience a mental health condition but there remains a substantial gap between ‘what works’ and what is happening in practice and policy. We need to shift gear quickly to bring existing evidence-based wellbeing and prevention approaches to scale, while investing in further research and development to find new and better solutions.
The purpose of the symposium
The symposium aims to bring together individuals from the public health, mental health, and other sectors to discuss the ways we can work together to advance Australia’s efforts in the promotion of mental wellbeing and the prevention of mental health conditions. The symposium has four objectives:
Increase people’s understanding of key concepts relating to promotion and prevention in mental health, and the role they can play in their setting.
Highlight the current state of the evidence and showcase examples of successful promotion and prevention programs across the lifespan, with an emphasis on those developed and/or available in Australia, and those developed for priority cohorts.
Examine what’s happening in Australia, and what’s needed to improve the availability and impacts of existing initiatives; embed promotion and prevention in government policy; and generate further advances in practice and research across the lifespan, and with a focus on equity.
Discuss opportunities for partnership and collaboration between the public health, mental health, and other sectors to create a genuine multidisciplinary, cross-sectoral approach to this endeavour.
Bursaries
The Queensland Mental Health Commission is pleased to offer bursaries to eligible Queenslanders to attend the symposium. Please visit our Bursaries page to apply.
Register to attend the Symposium
For futher information and to attend the Symposium go to:
https://phaa.eventsair.com/QuickEventWebsitePortal/preventive-mental-health-symposium/website
