Mental health emergencies, the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, mobile crisis teams, dual diagnosis, trauma and PTSD — care for the moments when waiting isn’t an option.
Carla worked the late shift at a corner pharmacy in Camden, New Jersey, the kind of neighbourhood where the medical examiner’s van had become a familiar sight. On a Thursday in March, an older woman walked up to the counter holding a creased printout from a community group. She was 68, her name was Beverly, … Read more
Eleanor Park, sixty-seven, retired from the Seattle public school system three months before her stroke. Her husband Daniel watched her right side go slack while she was making coffee one Sunday morning, dialed 911, and rode in the ambulance to Harborview. The clot-busting drug worked. Eleanor walked out of the hospital nine days later with … Read more
Eleanor Park, sixty-seven, retired from the Seattle public school system three months before her stroke. Her husband Daniel watched her right side go slack while she was making coffee one Sunday morning, dialed 911, and rode in the ambulance to Harborview. The clot-busting drug worked. Eleanor walked out of the hospital nine days later with … Read more
Devon was 22, a junior at Arizona State, the kind of student who built mechanical keyboards and ran a Discord server for indie game devs. He had used cannabis since high school. The change began the week he switched from flower to a 92 percent THC concentrate his roommate brought back from a Phoenix dispensary. … Read more
Devon was 22, a junior at Arizona State, the kind of student who built mechanical keyboards and ran a Discord server for indie game devs. He had used cannabis since high school. The change began the week he switched from flower to a 92 percent THC concentrate his roommate brought back from a Phoenix dispensary. … Read more
Margaret was 71, a retired librarian in Tucson, Arizona, who had been on lithium for forty-three years for bipolar I disorder. Her psychiatrist had retired the previous winter, and her primary care physician inherited the prescription without much review. In late August, during a heatwave, her cardiologist added lisinopril for blood pressure and a low-dose … Read more
Margaret was 71, a retired librarian in Tucson, Arizona, who had been on lithium for forty-three years for bipolar I disorder. Her psychiatrist had retired the previous winter, and her primary care physician inherited the prescription without much review. In late August, during a heatwave, her cardiologist added lisinopril for blood pressure and a low-dose … Read more
Marisol was nineteen, a sophomore at the University of Denver, when her residence director found her unconscious on the bathroom floor. Her roommate had called twice that week, worried. Marisol had stopped going to the dining hall in November. By February, she weighed 78 pounds. The paramedics noted a heart rate of 32 beats per … Read more
Marisol was nineteen, a sophomore at the University of Denver, when her residence director found her unconscious on the bathroom floor. Her roommate had called twice that week, worried. Marisol had stopped going to the dining hall in November. By February, she weighed 78 pounds. The paramedics noted a heart rate of 32 beats per … Read more
Maya Reynolds, fourteen, sat in the children’s emergency department in Newark on a Tuesday night, holding her mother’s hand and waiting. Maya had told her school counselor that morning that she had been thinking about her stepfather’s pistol for the last week, that she had Googled how to load it, and that she had stood … Read more