May is Mental Health Month. According to Youth.Gov, Mental Health Month was established in 1949, to increase awareness of the importance of mental health and wellness in Americans' lives, and to celebrate recovery from mental illness. We take the opportunity to focus this column on the role of mental health in the disciplinary process.

The call for wider attention to attorney well-being has been growing louder for years. The pandemic crisis refocused everyone's attention on issues of mental health and that is particularly true within our profession. The American Bar Association and the Pennsylvania Bar Association have both supported firms adopting a seven-prong "Well Being Pledge." This comes in part as our profession begins to accept, acknowledge, and proactively deal with what is essentially a mental health crisis within our profession. Maintaining mental health and addressing issues as they arise is incumbent upon attorneys in connection with compliance with Rule of Professional Conduct 1.1 Competence.