Keynotes

Eric Kussin was in the midst of an ascending career in professional sports when a debilitating mental health crisis stopped his life in its tracks. Due to unresolved personal life traumas that he failed to appropriately address at a younger age and life experiences he was unaware were affecting his mental health –Eric experienced a major crash that left him almost permanently in bed, and with severe cognitive impairment, for over two and a half years.

Eric underwent many failed treatments– including trying over 50 combinations of psychotropic drugs, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) as well as Electro-Convulsive Therapy (ECT or “Shock Therapy”). Eventually, he told that he has a treatment-resistant mental illness. It wasn’t long after hearing this that he was introduced to an integrative psychotherapist as well as a psychiatrist who used both traditional and holistic approaches to treat his mind, body and central nervous system and that is when he began his journey to wellness and getting his life back.

On his path to mental wellbeing, Eric was determined to share his story in effort to help others, and at the end of 2017 he launched a nonprofit, #SameHere Global Mental Health Movement. The organization is comprised of athletes, celebrities, expert practitioners, advocates, and everyday heroes who’ve come together to normalize society’s perception of mental health and make it part of our everyday conversation.

In this discussion, Eric will share why using an integrated whole body approach is critical to effectively improve overall mental wellness and resilience no matter where someone is on the mental health continuum.

Join us for lunch to explore how integrated mental health care can work to create a care plan that is truly integrated and innovative in approaching whole person, whole body and mind wellness. A multi-disciplinary panel of approaches involving psychiatry, psychotherapy, eco therapy, trauma informed yoga, sand play, art therapy, and breath work will explore a case presentation together in a grand rounds format. The panel will be demonstrating a practice model that moves integrated mental health care, from the periphery of “complementary and alternative” to the front-line treatment of choice. An outpatient “plus” level of care, where an integrated mental health team works to provide a client multiple sessions per week working collaboratively with the client and each other.

The grand rounds format will be utilized, where a complex client presentation, including intersectionality as a key element, will be examined first though the individual lens of each discipline. Following will be an active discussion of how the team would work to synthesize a comprehensive and cohesive wellness plan building and complimenting on the work of each discipline.

Together is always more, there are so many parts to the human experience, it is easy to become overwhelmed when working alone in support of a client so desperate for recovery. The panel will demonstrate the profound benefits of working collaboratively, where traditional western medicine meets holistic and expressive approaches under the same sky and in the same healing universe. The human condition is multiple, no symptom or suffering happens without many conditions also being present- our approaches need to mirror this truth effectively.