Deakin University’s Dr Tatyana Rocks was in Ballarat on Monday to present at the Ballarat Mental Health Forum, with a practical solution to Australia’s skyrocketing mental health crisis.

She said over the last five or ten years, research has started to link dietary patterns with mental health, with a simple, leafy diet a good start. 

“We’ve heard about diet – you need to eat this or that – for decades now, but it’s usually about weight, or type 2 diabetes comes up,” Dr Rocks said. “But what we see now is that by changing diet, you can actually improve mental health.”

A post-doctoral Fernwood Foundation Research Fellow at the Food & Mood Centre, Dr Rocks said the way to improve mental health just by munching is to eat an “Mediterranean diet within Australia”. 

“You don’t have to have any expensive ingredients or anything special, but basically increasing consumption of whole foods. A plant-based diet with whole grains, fruit, nuts and olive oil,” she said. 

Mental Health Foundation Australia’s chairman Jim Goodin said as Victoria had 686 suicides in 2016/17 – more than double the road toll – forums to discuss ways to improve mental health were vital. 

“The other huge issue we’re dealing with is the flooding of emergency departments at the moment … 52,000 presentations for mental health issues,” he said. “We have to do something about this.”

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