Leading Population Health INitiatives

Society is facing great challenges. America’s psychologists have been responding with compassionate care, science, grit, and creativity. APA’s staff, psychologists, and students are taking actions that bring our science, application, and practice as well as the nation’s best thinkers forward to solve some of our biggest problems. 

Whether it is addressing health equity, promoting mental health alongside physical health, understanding and confronting anti-science and misinformation, standing against racism and standing up for inclusion and belonging, responding to the impacts of climate change, reimagining the workplace, and battling the children's mental health crisis, we have become the "go to" expert source by government, industry, courts, education, and media. 

We alone cannot solve all of society's problems. As a scientific, professional public serving membership association, we do play a role. Our nation's divided politics, regressive actions by our governing institutions, and limited civic participation focused on the common good will make the next 10, 20, and even 50 years difficult. We will see more guns, not fewer; more violence and less compassion; more premature death, discord, and discontent. We will stand against racism, but the battle will be long. Division will remain a norm for a period of time. But all is not lost, because America has more than 140,000 psychologists who are members of the APA who are ready to lead with purpose and hope.

What we can do is help.  We can provide critical pivots for society where we are uniquely positioned to do so. As a scientific and professional organization, APA is very much on the right course; we have had exceptional leadership in recent years. However, society and our field are at an inflection point. Moving psychology into the places where people live, work, play, and love is our priority for the next 5 years. Population health is every psychologists’ business. We will be adapting our models of care, practice, and inquiry, collaborating more across our historic boundaries, integrating research into practice, and bringing applied psychology to our research and healthcare services. 

We must always do the next, right thing. Leading on population health is that next right thing for APA.  We need leadership who can lead at a responsive pace in these ambiguous and challenging times. An “everyday APA”, is one were we can call upon our members to be engaged with APA every day and an APA that is relevant to every one of our members for everything that matters to them. This values-based leadership starts with our shared understanding of psychology and our expectations for a safer, healthier, and more equal society.

Prictured above is one image from the visit that the Office of the Surgeon General had with Dr. Butter's program at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, OH.  Noting and observing a matrix of population health programs designed to address mental and behavioral health "upstream" from illness, here we see the Surgeon General Dr. Murthy sitting on a panel hosted by On Our Sleeves, the National Movement for  Children's Mental Health. (see www.OnOurSleeves.org) This is one symbol of a large and comprehensive committment and history Dr. Butter has in implementing population health programming. (No endorsement by the Office of the Surgeon General is implied.)