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Promoting Recovery for Individuals with Unidentified Trauma and Co-Occurring Disorders
Advancement of recovery for individuals with Co-Occurring Disorders has been recognized as a significant principle for the transformation of behavioral health services. Co-Occurring Disorders is defined as a mental health disorder being experienced along with the presence of a substance use...
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Trauma and “Whole Person” Healthcare
Any effort to understand and treat co-occurring disorders cannot ignore the prevalence of trauma in the lives of those who are struggling with recovery from mental illness and addiction. A look at the trauma prevalence data in both general and behavioral health populations clearly makes the case....
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Why Trauma Informed Care with Vulnerable Populations?
A vulnerable population can be described as a group of persons whose range of options is severely limited, who are frequently subjected to coercion in decision making, or who may be compromised in their ability to give informed consent (U.S. National Library of Medicine). There are many populations...
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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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Trauma-Informed Care Leads to More Integrated Care
Our inattention to the emotional dimensions of health and illness is a public health perfect storm, especially for the mentally ill. This group of people experiences high rates of illness, suffers greatly, uses an enormous amount of our precious healthcare dollars, and dies 25 years earlier than...
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Integrating Trauma and Addiction Treatment
Individuals struggling with addiction who also work in a first responder capacity face unique challenges in addiction treatment and recovery. Often referred to as uniformed professionals, these individuals are very likely to work in high-stress environments with an increased risk of physical...
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Responding to First Responders: Even Superheroes Need Help Sometimes
As we contemplated writing about the job-related behavioral health needs of first responders, we were reminded of the post 9/11 poster showing two swaggering 6-year-old boys wearing blankets as capes with the tagline “Even Superheroes Need Help Sometime.” This poster was part of an advertising...
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Addressing Trauma and Substance Abuse with Peer-Led Programs
People who experience trauma, either as children or later in life as adults, are at a higher risk of developing mental health and substance use problems and chronic physical health conditions. Exposure to childhood trauma includes physical, emotional abuse, and sexual abuse; violence; neglect;...
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Partners in Integration: Addressing Need by Supporting NYC Workers
In today’s evolving healthcare system, there is a growing need for an integrated healthcare workforce to better address the needs of patients with complex and interrelated medical and behavioral health conditions. However, workforce development supporting skills enhancement around integrated...
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An Experienced Social Worker’s First Natural Disaster
The call went out, “Are you ready to roll?” This was the question that my director at the Nassau County Office of Mental Health, Chemical Dependency and Developmental Disabilities Services (the Office) asked me the day before Hurricane Sandy hit Nassau County as we prepared to make our rounds...
