FROM LARGE CITIES TO SMALL TOWNS
SUICIDE HAS BECOME A TRAGIC
AND ALL TOO COMMON EVENT
What we are doing to combat this tragedy:
We seek out and invest in medical research that unlocks needed information which ultimately will lead to treatments and cures.
We promote awareness, education, and information through our upcoming film Portrait of a Suicide
The Film
Young Minds Foundation is proud to announce our upcoming film Portrait of a Suicide. For the last few years we have been working on this film which uniquely profiles the days before Josh died. The videos he left us have been masterfully edited with thoughtful clinical narration.
We have a team of experts in their fields joining us to work on this film. These men have given their time and talents taking our vision and enhancing it making the final product one of the most relevant films made on the topic of suicide.
Upon completion we will have one version to be used by the National Institute of Health as part of their physician training, another will be used to educate counselors, police officers, and those who face the challenges of identifying and dealing with suicide as part of their jobs. One more version will be used for students from middle school to college.
Through the utilization of focus groups of professionals we have continued to make improvements. It is our hope and our plan to start the conversation and remove the stigma surrounding mental health issues. Merely finding the funding for this project has been almost impossible, yet here we are. We are at one of the final stages, obtaining permission to use the snippets of music he recorded in the videos. To date we have raised the money we have needed right as we have needed it.
We have professionals from the academic medical field, film, TV writers and producers, editors, all volunteering their time on this film. We would like to recognize and thank two of our “super stars”. Without them, we would not have a heard hitting film. We would still only have raw videos. They have taken the information and created a film that while difficult to watch presents suicide in an honest and gut wrenching presentation. It is factual. It is real.
OUR CREW:
Lewis R. Baxter, Jr. M.D.
- Lew Baxter was born in Jacksonville, FL. High school was at Loomis-Chaffee School in Windsor CT, college was at Yale, and medical school was the University of Florida College of Medicine (UF). He did residency training in Psychiatry, and further training in neuroscience, pharmacology, statistics, and nuclear medicine, at UCLA. At UCLA he also began making documentary films with Phil Condit.
- He has been variously Professor of Psychiatry, Pharmacology, Neuroscience and/or Psychology at UCLA, the University of Alabama School of Medicine, and UF. He is best known for discovering the brain systems involved in obsessive-compulsive disorder and its treatment response to both medications and behavior therapy, and for basic science studies in animals on brain systems involved in social behavior. He is past Chairman of the National Foundation for Mental Health in Washington, D.C. While at UF he also directed general medical care programs for homeless and other indigent persons.
- Relevant to this project and the making of Portrait of a Suicide, for many years he gave the lectures for medical students at UCLA and UF on suicide, and has delivered invited lectures on suicide. Personally, he has lost two brothers, an aunt, a mother-in-law and a grandmother-in-law to suicide.
- He is now retired from university work and living in Santa Fe, NM with his wife, Jane Gregoritch, MD, and children John and Rhea Baxter. He is part owner of Handersen Publishing in Lincoln, NE, and has authored many books for children and adults.
Phil Condit is a multiple award-winning filmmaker, photographer, and artist in Los Angeles California.
- While in college he directed Some Tormenting Dream, a dramatization of the suicide of a fellow student which garnered an honorable mention at the Southwest Film Festival.
- After college, Phil took a job in documentary films and worked his way up from film assistant to director of the Behavioral Sciences Media Laboratory at the Neuropsychiatric Institute and Hospital at UCLA.
- Over the following decades he dedicated himself to creating award-winning documentaries and programs designed to help people afflicted with physical and mental disorders, including Suicide, a film featuring interviews with families and survivors of suicide attempts.
Gayle Lee
Founder of Young Minds Foundation and Co-Founder of the My Mind Wars Program. Gayle is the aunt of Joshua featured in the film Portrait of a Suicide. She serves as Executive Producer learning everything about film-making from Lou and Phil, who work tirelessly moving this project forward. Gayle has led large and small organizations throughout her long career in nonprofit leadership. She currently works as a change agent for her own company G. Lee Resources and System Director of Research for a hospital system.
Jake Goddard
Co-Founder of My Mind Wars Program of Young Minds Foundation. He is the brother of Joshua Goddard, featured in Portrait of a Suicide. Jake has been a fierce fund raiser for this film. Jake volunteered to read the film’s ending, making it both poignant and realistic. He is a husband and father of three children and works full time at Southwest Airlines.
Depression is darkness that impacts hundreds of thousands of people each year. Suicide is one of the horrible outcomes of depression. Young Minds Research is dedicated to finding cures and treatments that ultimately save lives.
COME JOIN THE FIGHT TO FIND ANSWERS, TREATMENTS, and CURES
Young Minds Foundation is an IRS 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. All contributions are tax-deductible.
MEDICAL RESEARCH PROJECTS
RESEARCH PROJECTS MADE POSSIBLE BY THE GRAHAM FAMILY
Background:
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a non-invasive electromagnetic treatment currently approved for treatment of major depressive disorder (MDD). There is growing evidence that delivering TMS treatment to specific areas in the brain would yield better clinical outcomes when treating MDD, especially if it were more tailored to individual patients. Dr. Oathes is taking this idea one step further and suggesting that using functional MRI-imaging to guide and target TMS treatments might yield an even greater leap forward in treating patients with MDD, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or both. TMS has not yet been established as a treatment for patients suffering from PTSD. Therefore, the results from this study could form the basis of a new treatment for both PTSD and MDD.
Research:
In this study, patients with MDD, PTSD or both have been and will be recruited at the University of Pennsylvania and through the Philadelphia VA hospital. Following a baseline screening interview, patients will undergo brain scans using functional MRI techniques. Results of the scans will then be used to to identify the location of the two most op.mal brain targets for TMS treatment for each patient. Treatments will be spread over a two month period, and patients’ depression and anxiety symptoms will be evaluated throughout treatment and aHer treatment. With the results of study, Dr. Oathes hopes to determine if the targeted treatment is an improvement.
Results:
As of April 2018, 16 patients were enrolled in the clinical trial. Four patients had completed all treatment visits and an additional 5 patients had completed at least half of the treatment sessions. The research team has seen a reduction in PTSD and depressive systems in some of the patients who completed their treatments. However, these results are s.ll preliminary, and more patients need to complete treatment before any conclusions can be drawn. Dr. Oathes has increased his patient outreach efforts, and is currently recruiting 1-4 patients per month. He recently requested a 9 month extension to ensure adequate .me for patient recruitment and data analysis. The expected end date for this project is July 31, 2019. Once this study is complete, Dr. Oathes plans to publish the findings in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, to offer this treatment to patients at his institution and to write a grant application to extend his findings into a larger clinical trial. He has already given two invited talks about his research at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine: one to the Center of Treatment and Anxiety and one to the Cohen Family Military Clinic.
Background:
Suicide due to depression has become a leading cause of death around the world, particularly among children, adolescents and young adults. The current treatment for severe depression includes antidepressant drug treatment, often in combination therapy. It takes approximately 4 weeks for drugs to produce mood-lifting effects, and during that time, particularly in children and adolescents, patients may experience an increase in suicidal thoughts and behaviors. Previous research suggests that a specific brain cell receptor called 5-HT1AR plays a critical role in causing this increase in suicidal ideation. This animal model research project repurposes an already approved drug used for high blood pressure (pindolol) and an anti-anxiety drug (buspirone) to block this receptor, in an effort to reduce the suicidal effects the antidepressant drugs can cause during this crucial 4 week period.
Research:
Mice were used to determine if pindolol and buspirone used in combination with an antidepressant drug could be efficacious in treating acute depression. Similar to humans, acute exposure to antidepressant drugs causes mice to become impulsive and anxious, making them an ideal model to determine the impact of different doses of pindolol and buspirone on antidepressant drug exposure before beginning a human clinical trial. Dr. Hollinger also examined age-dependent effects by including early adolescent, late adolescent and adult mice. Following treatment, mice behaviors in the elevated plus maze test and the forced swim test were evaluated to determine their level of anxiety. These behaviors correlate to the suicidal ideation and negative impulse behaviors that humans often experience early in the course of their antidepressant drugs.
Results:
This project was completed in early 2018. Dr. Hollinger found that buspirone (anti-anxiety drug) was ineffective in reducing anxiety in mice treated with an antidepressant drug, and she established an effective dose of pindolol (high blood pressure drug) at reducing anxiety in mice after antidepressant drug treatment. She is in the process of submitting her results to a peer-reviewed scientific journal for publication. These results support the conversion of the determined mouse dose for use in a pilot human clinical trial in pediatric patients.
Thank you for your generous support of the Young Minds Foundation.
Young Minds Foundation is an IRS 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. All contributions are tax-deductible.
YOUNG MINDS FOUNDATION & Programs
The overall mission of Young Minds, a 501(c)(3) organization is to provide awareness and education that enhances the lives of children and adults with emphasis on helping those who may be most at risk.
Subscribe to our mailing list and newsletter
