September 7 Lecture: 19th U.S. Surgeon General to Address Topic of Stress in America

A Nation Under Pressure: The Public Health Consequences of Stress in America | NCCIH

Speaker: Dr. Vivek Murthy, 19th U.S. Surgeon General 

When: September 7, 2017, 11 a.m. - 12 p.m. ET

Where: Building 10 Masur Auditorium, NIH Main Campus, Bethesda, MD

Remote Participation: Join us by NIH Videocast, or on NCCIH Facebook Live

Stress levels are on the rise in our increasingly busy world. In a 2015 national survey, 24 percent of U.S. adults reported extreme stress, an increase from 18 percent just one year earlier. About one-third reported their stress had increased over the past year; fewer than half as many said it had decreased. The top sources of stress were money, work, and family responsibilities.

In this year’s Stephen E. Straus Distinguished Lecture in the Science of Complementary Therapies, the former U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy will share his perspectives on stress in America. In a conversation with National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Francis Collins, he will explore the individual- and population-level impact of stress and steps we can take to reduce its effect on our health and our lives.

Dr. Murthy and Dr. Collins will discuss what research is revealing about not only the ways in which stress affects us, but also the approaches people can incorporate into their lives to help reduce stress, such as regular exercise, social connection, and contemplative practices, including meditation. They will also examine how improvements in mental and emotional well-being can have a positive impact on the lives of individuals and communities and explore how models of successful interventions might be scaled to reach larger communities.

This lecture is made possible with support from the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health.

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