Hall-Brooke Offers Depression Screening

WESTPORT — As a community service, Hall-Brooke Behavioral Health Services, 47 Long Lots Road, will do free screening for depression from 4 to 7 pm, Thursday, October 6.

The screening is also available from 1 to 4 pm at The Center, operated by Hall-Brooke, at 2400 Main Street, Bridgeport, and is provided by both English and Spanish speakers.

Hall-Brooke’s services are part of the National Depression Screening Day, which makes available the free opportunity for diagnosis to persons throughout the United States who may be suffering from depression or bipolar disease. Bi-polar disease is a condition in which a person suffers severe mood swings from great excitation or euphoria to deep depression. Both conditions are leading national health concerns.

“Although both men and women suffer from depression, women between the ages 18 to 45 represent the largest population affected, and, yet, four times as many men that women die by suicide,” notes Debra Iversen, director of Out Patient Services at Hall-Brooke. “Bi-polar disease is equally common in men and women, but research shows women’s episodes are three times as frequent.”

The free diagnosis does not require undertaking treatment at Hall-Brooke.

Hall-Brooke, a mental health facility service Fairfield County, is a wholly owned subsidiary of St Vincent’s Health Services of Bridgeport, and is affiliated with the Department of Psychology of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University.