Area of Interest - Mental Health Within My Practice

Starting ACI3622, My area of Interest

So I have been pondering for some time on an area that really interests me within my practice. Today is the day that I have finally come to a conclusion. I will be researching the study behind the relationship between mental health and performing arts. What are the positive and negative relationship between the two? I find that my knowledge of the relationship between the two only comes from life experience and things I have learnt so far, it is important that I look at the research that has already been done, and gather how this works within my practice. However on initial google, there isn't as much information as I would have expected. Yes, many people know that performing arts can be used as a tool to help people who suffer from a mental illness as it allows them an outlet. On the other hand their is little to no information about the help a professional performer can get who is suffering from a mental health illness. Most performers will know the amount of freedom you feel when you loose yourself in a dance class, singing a song or maybe performing a monologue as a crazy character. From my past discussion with peers in professional training they would describe that feeling as an escape, a disconnect from every day society. Wow! how lucky are we to have the opportunity to escape from the world, pretend that you are someone else for a matter of moments. I cant imagine my life any other way! Most people do not have that luxury, and they never get a chance to escape. Someone with a mental health illness may be advised to join an acting or a dance class to help with their well being, is this something that works? and should we in our practice be trained not only on how to teach our craft but also support those coming in with a mental health illness who want to recover and possibly even become professionals? Although there are many, many positives floating around here, we need to be aware in our practice that professional performers can tend to struggle with a mental health issues at one point in their life? The strain of performing perfectly in front of an audience every night, the unsociable hours, unstable contract, low wage (at times), pressure to look a physical way and audition process are just a few areas that come to mind that have a potential to harm a performers mental well being. Can our practice be as enjoyable as it was in an armature class growing up, when the pressure was not as intense and the word "bills" and "auditions" weren't even on our radar yet?
Going into Module ACI3622 I know that to sort create my inquiry task/ proposal I will need to make my question more clear. For the moment I am bouncing the ideas around in the area that I am in interested in studying. I hope to mind map and have a clearer decision on this by the end of the week.