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For Those on the Threshold of Adulthood: No Thresholds Beckon
Supported housing for young adults living with mental/emotional challenges, including chemical dependency, is a rare commodity in New York and is almost non-existent on Staten Island. Once they leave home or the foster care system, no government funding, no agency contracts, no appropriate...
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Animal Assisted Therapy for Vulnerable Youth
For almost two decades, North Shore Child & Family Guidance Center has been utilizing Animal Assisted Therapy (AAT) in outpatient mental health work with youths and their families, working in partnership with local canine and equine organizations. An adjunct to traditional therapy, AAT relies...
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Innovation and Efficacy Modeled at ANDRUS: Meeting a Vulnerable Population Using a Sensory and Body Regulation Approach
Meeting a Vulnerable Population Where They are At Some children experience mental and behavioral difficulties that make their daily life a challenge. They struggle to regulate their emotions and cope with a world that isn’t always receptive to their reactive behavioral outbursts. At risk...
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Supporting Youths in Their Recovery Journey to Adulthood
The New York State children’s behavioral health community is in the last stages of redesigning the children’s behavioral health Medicaid benefits. Once approved by the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare (CMS), the new benefits will represent the most significant expansion of children’s...
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Are We There Yet? Reflections on the 5 Years of Children’s Medicaid Transformation
It is hard to believe that five years have passed since the New York State Children’s MRT Subcommittee released its blueprint to address the unique and complex needs of children in Medicaid Managed Care. In many ways the time has flown by yet today, New York State’s target date to fully...
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The System-of-Care Movement Through a Trauma-Informed Lens: Implications for Systems Transformation
Trying to change systems is never an easy task. Efforts to encourage, argue, incentivize, and mandate change, are often met with piecemeal results, only to revert back to business as usual. On rare occasions however, profound change can happen quickly and even effortlessly. These changes often...
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Youth in Transition
This article is the third in a quarterly series giving voice to the perspectives of individuals with lived experiences as they share their opinions on a particular topic. The young authors of this column came together as a focus group of peers to discuss their experiences and collaborate on this...
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Early Identification of Childhood Disorders in Primary Care
Primary care providers are usually the first clinicians to identify behavioral health problems in children. Children with disruptive behavioral problems show symptoms during their primary care visits and their families rely on their primary providers for information, resources and...
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Circle of Security Parenting Program: A Wise Early Intervention Investment to Promote Healthy Futures
As New York State transitions children, youth, and family services into Medicaid managed care, there must be far greater attention, capacity, and investment in tools and strategies that promote early childhood development. According to The Heckman Equation, investment in early development is a...
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“Children’s System of Care” in Westchester County, New York
The System of Care concept for children and adolescents with mental health challenges and their families was first published in 1986 in an article by Beth Stroul and Robert Friedman. They articulated a definition for a System of Care along with a framework and philosophy to guide its...
