Products and Resources Catalog

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a formidable challenge to care continuity for community mental health clients with serious mental illness. Providers have had to quickly pivot the modes of delivering critical services. What does this look like for practitioners who are delivering cognitive behavioral therapeutic (CBT) interventions for psychosis? This hour-long webinar serves to help practitioners consider critical intervention targets and high-yield motivational, cognitive, and behavioral strategies that are amenable to telephonic encounters, telehealth, or digital accompaniment. The strategies that were selected are appropriate for delivery in any combination of the above-mentioned modalities. Companion clinical tip sheets and self-directed CBT for psychosis learning resources will be provided to webinar participants. Objectives: Identify key psychosis drivers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Walk through high-yield strategies that are amendable to remote administration of CBTp or CBTp-Informed care Discuss evidence-based and evidence-informed digital augmentation of clincial services for individuals with psychosis   Download slides here   Resources COVID-19 PDF - COVID-19 Resources for those with Serious Mental Illness Cognitive Behavior Theory and Treatment Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies The Beck Institute Cognitive Behavior Therapy for Psychosis (CBTp) SMI Advisor - 1 hour webinar orientation 3 Hour E-Primer course on HealtheKnowledge North American CBTp Network Video - Stress Bucket Analogy  

This is the first session of the three-part webinar series, Making a Good Connection: Engaging Students and Families in School Tele-Mental Health, that is geared toward providers who are making the transition from in-person to telehealth services. Session content focuses on practical strategies and equity concerns related to engaging children, adolescents and families using distance technology. The presenters devote the first segment of each hour-long presentation to a specific topic, then address attendee-submitted questions. To view the recording, click on the blue "View Resource" button above. Download the slides here. Download the FAQ Sheet here. For more information about the remaining sessions for this series, click here.  

Recorded May 5th, 2020 Panelists: Danis Russell Jeff Coady Kwame Gyasi Jeanne Pulvermacher Dave Gomel Tom Wright Judi Jobe Michelle DeRosso   Transcript_Region 5: Supporting Behavioral Health Programs & Personnel During COVID-19

Amid the current COVID-19 social distancing and stay at home orders many behavioral health providers have quickly shifted their primary interactions with clients to remote engagement. For some, this means using video conferencing software to simulate an in-person meeting. However, for many people access to a computer or tablet and reliable internet service is not available. For these individuals you may need to engage with them primarily, or solely, through the phone via voice calls or texts. This tool will provide information about strategies for quality engagement with clients using the phone.    This guidance can be applied to your work during the COVID-19 public health emergency, as well as when engaging with clients who may live in remote, rural, and otherwise difficult to access areas. Please note that it is best to talk with your agency's administration to determine any potential issues or concerns with providing remote services, including, but not limited to, HIPAA compliance, reimbursement, and authorizations. 

This webinar was about the power of Courageous Conversations, a model for creating safe spaces for staff and students to have challenging, but necessary conversations about inequity. Maria E. Restrepo-Toro, M.S., Project Manager for Training and Education at Yale University’s Program for Recovery and Community Health and Manager of the New England Mental Health Technology Transfer Center, reviewed the four agreements of a courageous conversation, explained how to use the courageous conversation compass, and discussed ideas for starting courageous conversations in your classrooms and schools. To download a copy of this presentation, click here.  Presenter: Maria E. Restrepo-Toro, BNS, M.S., Manager, New England MHTTC

The Northwest Mental Health Technology Transfer Center is partnering with Forefront Suicide Prevention Center & DBT in Schools to bring you online DBT STEPS-A lessons and 2 Q&A sessions with the trainers. About this Resource: Doctors Jim & Lizz Mazza & their family in their living room as they teach kids the basics of emotional regulation and specific skills such as mindfulness, distress tolerance and interpersonal effectiveness—essential skills at any time, but even more critical during COVID-19. Our kids -- all of us -- are upended emotionally right now. Tune in with your kids to help you reduce conflict and to keep this pandemic in perspective.    Audience: Parents, students, educators, and more!   This recording is one of nineteen recorded DBT STEPS-A lessons. It is not necessary to watch the DBT STEPS-A online lessons in order.    >> Access all DBT STEPS-A recorded lessons here. << Interested in watching live? Tune into the DBT in Schools YouTube channel every Tuesday and Thursday morning at 10am for the live sessions. Registration is not required.   Want more information about DBT in Schools? Visit their website and sign up for their newsletters here. The DBT STEPS-A lessons are part of The Well-Being Series - Connections During COVID-19: Mental Wellness Webinars for Families and Educators. Click here to learn more about our series of webinars for kids, parents, and educators, focusing on mental wellness and suicide prevention. About the Presenters: Dr. James J. Mazza is the co-author of the DBT STEPS-A social emotional learning curriculum for middle and high school students. He received his masters and Ph.D. in school psychology from the University of Wisconsin – Madison. He is a professor at the University of Washington – Seattle where he has been for over 20 years teaching and conducting research in the field of adolescent mental health.       Dr. Elizabeth Dexter-Mazza is a certified DBT therapist and co-author of the DBT STEPS-A social emotional learning curriculum for middle and high school students. She received her doctoral degree from the School of Professional Psychology at Pacific University in 2004, and completed her predoctoral internship at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine/Montefiore Medical Center’s Adolescent Depression and Suicide Program. Dr. Dexter-Mazza completed her postdoctoral fellowship under the direction of Dr. Marsha Linehan at the University of Washington.   Want more information and school mental health resources? Visit the Northwest MHTTC's School Mental Health page and sign up for our monthly newsletter for regular updates about events, trainings, and resources available to the Northwest region.  

The Telehealth Toolbox for School Personnel is a practical and concise guide to incorporating telehealth into your routine as a provider working with students.   Author(s): Franta, E., Morse, M., Chadwell, M., Hoff, N., Clarke, B.L., Robinson, L./Mid-America MHTTC

Mental Health Issues among Older Hispanic and Latino Adults in the United States is a fact sheet based on the webinar; Older Latinos in the U.S.: Mental Health Issues provided by Bernardo Ng, MD. Latino older adults are considered heterogenic and are underrepresented in research, posing challenges for practitioners. Some of the most prevalent mental health disorders among older Latinos include depression, neurocognitive disorders due to Alzheimer´s disease, and other neurocognitive disorders. Mental health clinicians serving older Latinos should consider the use of translators, interpreters, or having access to Spanish-speaking professionals for monolingual clients. Also, they can increase health literacy by creating and disseminating educational materials in Spanish or other dialects. Clinicians interested in offering services to Latinos should assess their own level of cultural responsiveness regarding Hispanic and Latino cultures. Spanish Version

This is a recording of the Native Youth Telehealth Initiative Webinar, which took place on May 14, 2020. The recording begins at slide 12 of the presentation.   Dr. George Baston, MHRD, Ed.D CTE, and Natasha Peterson, BS, covered how to implement telehealth using the “Let’s Talk Interactive” platform and opportunities to collaborate with the National American Indian and Alaska Native MHTTC. Dr. Baston has worked in the health and human services field for 35 years starting out with Boys & Girls Clubs of America and eventually co-founding Solutions of Substance. Dr. Baston subsequently spent 20 years utilizing technology to deliver education, training, and interventions, including telehealth, to a variety of workforces and clients such as: community-based organizations, charter vocational schools (primary in rural communities); jails and other criminal justice settings; state addiction services provider associations; Addiction Technology Transfer Centers (ATTCs); certification boards; and telehealth implementations in schools and community based organizations. Dr. Baston has over 18 years experience as a Principal Investigator (PI) for Rural Utilities Distant Learning and Telehealth Grantees; Drug Free Communities Grantees (DFC), Housing Opportunities for Persons with HIV/AIDS (HOPWA), Prevention and Partnership Grants (PPG) and a wide variety of SAMSHA program evaluations . Other experience includes Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) implementation to utilize data for program improvement, primarily through facilitation of Plan Do Study Act (PDSA) cycles.   Collaboration Opportunity! An opportunity to participate in our Native Youth Telehealth Initiative, and receive intensive technical assistance, is announced in this webinar. Application information is given at the end of Dr. Baston's presentation. Six sites will be chosen from the applicants. Click HERE to learn more: read about the project, download the full slides, etc.

This is a recording of the webinar: Introduction to Peer Support in the Era of COVID-19, featuring Talor Gray, MPH, which took place on May 13, 2020.   In this webinar, you will learn strategies for peer support and how to make this work while social distancing. Talor Gray earned her BS from Drake University in 2014, majoring in Psychology with a research focus in Behavioral Neuroscience. With a passion for translating health behavior research into practice, she later received her MPH from the University of Iowa in Community and Behavioral Health. Talor has been involved in the mental health field for the past 10 years, working and volunteering at various non-profit, education, and public health agencies. Her experience ranges from providing individual peer support and systems navigation to public health program development and evaluation. Talor is a certified NAMI Provider and In Our Own Voice speaker, and has provided trainings in population mental health, disability sensitivity, and building self-advocacy skillsets. She currently works at Olmsted County Public Health in Rochester, MN as a Community Health Specialist focused on mental health and substance use topics.

Recording of the webinar titled Tools for Engagement in Person Centered Care Part 4: WRAP - An Approach to Person-Led Crisis and Post Crisis Planning, originally held on May 13, 2020.   Slide Presentation

Original Webinar Date: 05/18/2020 Leadership during change is, at best, a constant learning and adapting process. It requires leaders to reflect and learn about existing challenges; find solutions collaboratively with other leaders and team members; and determine new solutions, recognizing that finding solutions is an iterative process. In times of chaos and turbulence, the work of leading through change is further buffeted by the unpredictability and severity of the challenges being confronted. At times like this, leaders need different strategies to continue to “weather the storm” and lead effectively. This presentation recording explores these new strategies, including foresight thinking, foresight planning, and ongoing communications at all levels. This training is offered to mental health leadership (e.g., agency executives, program directors, frontline managers).   About the Facilitator: Dr. Suganya Sockalingam is a Founding Partner at Change Matrix, LLC, which supports agencies in addressing diversity, cultural competence, and cross-cultural communication as well as leadership, collaboration, and conflict management. Dr. Sockalingam focuses on supporting individuals, organizations, and systems to motivate, manage, and measure systems change. Currently, she serves as a training and technical assistance provider for several national technical assistance centers, and for other federal, national, state, territorial, and community agencies. She earned her doctorate at Washington State University and has worked in many capacities in public and behavioral health, both nationally and internationally, for over 25 years.

This document was created to help assess and implement policies in systems.  

  This document was created to use when developing policies that support advance directives in recovery-oriented systems.   

Links to these websites are for informational and educational purposes only. If you need legal advice, please consult a legal professional. These websites do not necessarily represent the opinions of the New England Mental Health Technology Transfer Center or the Yale Program for Recovery and Community Health.

The emergence of mental health as a talking point in media reports and conversations around COVID-19 has demonstrated how language can be a barrier to wellness and recovery. “Elevating Language through COVID-19” provides a 360-degree view of the language of behavioral health. In the training, we take a peer-centered look at how language is used by others to describe us, how we use language to describe ourselves, and how language can increase or decrease stigma and access to quality mental health recovery and wellness supports. In “Part One: The Power of Language,” we will look at the behavioral health language that has emerged through the COVID-19 pandemic, and discuss alternatives and opportunities.

Psychological First Aid (PFA) is an evidence-informed prevention strategy aimed at reducing distress and increasing resilience during and following mass disasters, including natural disasters and pandemics. PFA provides a flexible framework for specialty and non-specialty providers to support affected individuals and help them mobilize their natural, adaptive coping strategies. The Trauma Recovery Innovations program at the University of Washington has been adapting PFA to support members of the health care work force amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Presenters Michele Bedard-Gilligan, PhD is an Associate Professor in the UW Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the co-director of the Trauma Recovery Innovations program. Her program of research focuses on understanding response to traumatic events, with a focus on alcohol and substance misuse, and on building and testing interventions designed to promote recovery following trauma exposure. She is also a licensed clinical psychologist and maintains an active clinical practice.       Emily R. Dworkin, PhD, is a licensed clinical psychologist and an Acting Assistant Professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Her research focuses on trauma recovery, with a focus on identifying strategies to promote resilience and understanding the role of social relationships in post-trauma outcomes.       Download the presentation here Download Q&A here Resources UW Medicine Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences COVID-19: Resources to Promote Mental Well-Being For Providers: Psychological First Aid (PFA) Cheat Sheet PFA Coping Infographic PFA Core Skills Infographic  PFA Grounding Infographic   For Leadership: PFA Core Skills for Managers PFA Coping Infographic  PFA Grounding Infographic

Original Webinar Date: 05/19/2020 This webinar was hosted by our partner, California Primary Care Association (CPCA), and facilitated by Leora Wolf-Prusan, the School Mental Health Lead at the Pacific Southwest MHTTC. Health center staff are constantly asked to prioritize the patients’ need, sometimes resulting in overwhelming feelings of stress, compassion fatigue, and burn-out. In order to fully show up for those they serve, professionals need structural policy supports and practice changes that balances self and collective wellbeing. This archived webinar explores how we can create and maintain health care work cultures - now and always - where staff are resourced and ready to care for patients. Presenters discuss frameworks for why supporting health care professionals through practice and policy changes is critical to preventing burn-out, secondary stress, and compassion fatigue.   LEARNING OBJECTIVES Identify methods to assess areas of strength and areas of growth in support for health care professionals’ sustainability. Identify strategies to apply self and collective care through both practices and structural policies. Understand how self and collective care intersects with trauma-informed and resilience oriented workplace and culture.

The Pacific Southwest MHTTC Monthly Bulletin provides resources, events, and news that are relevant to the diverse mental health workforce in HHS Region 9. Each Monthly Bulletin includes a spotlight section on youth and young adult mental health, our national area of focus.

The Pacific Southwest MHTTC School Mental Health Monthly shares resources, events, and insights to support school leadership, educators, and staff throughout HHS Region 9.

On May 14th and May 21st, Janis Tondora lead this webinar which reviewed key indicators of PCRP from both a process and a documentation perspective. Particular emphasis was placed on strategies for maintaining a strengths-based recovery orientation in collaborative care planning while simultaneously meeting rigorous documentation standards associated with fiscal and regulatory requirements.   Learning Objectives: Identify a minimum of 3 differences between traditional methods of treatment planning and best-practice Person-Centered Recovery Planning Define the 4 component “Ps” of Person-Centered Recovery Planning (Philosophy, Process, Plan, and Product/Purpose) Learn strategies for respecting strengths-based, person-centered principles while also satisfying expectations associated with accreditation, and fiscal regulations, e.g., those associated with medical necessity criteria and/or funder documentation standard.     To access a copy of the presentation, click here.  To access the Person-Centered Care Planning Overview resource, click here.  To access the Recovery Roadmap: Tips for Recognizing a Good Person-Centered Plan, click here.  To access the Recovery Roadmap: Tips for Recognizing Person-Centered Process, click here.    Presenter: Janis Tondora, Psy.D. is the Director of Systems Transformation, Yale Program for Recovery and Community Health. Dr. Tondora’s professional interests focus on the design, implementation, and evaluation of services that promote self-determination, recovery, and community inclusion among individuals living with behavioral health conditions. She has provided training and consultation to over two dozen states and numerous international collaborators seeking to develop person-centered planning models and programs.

Session Three: Understanding Grief and Increasing Wellness Trauma-Informed Learning for Early Childhood Educators Series May 21, 2020 This session focused on the grief that different traumatic experiences can trigger, including the current pandemic. By understanding that the experience of grief can be used to build resilience, this session provides participants with tools needed to build and cultivate resilience within themselves to accomplish this for themselves and the children they work with. Other topics that were covered include the stages of grief and variability within those stages; the developmental psychology of grief; strategies for building and promoting resilience practices that foster connection and wellness among children, staff, and communities. Slide deck  Recording My Personal Wellness Wheel from Resilient Futures Self Care Tips Sheet Developmental Responses to COVID-19 Trauma from Resilient Futures   Learning objectives for this series: Learn evidence-based practices that teach children how to replace trauma-based coping strategies with resilience-based strategies. Understand and develop strategies to address trauma-based inequities in your systems and raise equity. Review and practice several evidence-based wellness and resilience practices.   Early Childhood Educator Training Series Session one: Understanding Trauma and Stress Session two: Cultural Humility and Responsiveness

Psychological First Aid (PFA) is an evidence-informed prevention strategy aimed at reducing distress and increasing resilience during and following mass disasters, including natural disasters and pandemics. PFA provides a flexible framework for specialty and non-specialty providers to support affected individuals and help them mobilize their natural, adaptive coping strategies. The Trauma Recovery Innovations program at the University of Washington has been adapting PFA to support members of the health care work force amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Presenters Michele Bedard-Gilligan, PhD is an Associate Professor in the UW Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the co-director of the Trauma Recovery Innovations program. Her program of research focuses on understanding response to traumatic events, with a focus on alcohol and substance misuse, and on building and testing interventions designed to promote recovery following trauma exposure. She is also a licensed clinical psychologist and maintains an active clinical practice.         Emily R. Dworkin, PhD, is a licensed clinical psychologist and an Acting Assistant Professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Her research focuses on trauma recovery, with a focus on identifying strategies to promote resilience and understanding the role of social relationships in post-trauma outcomes.       Download the Presentation here View Q&A here Resources UW Medicine Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences COVID-19: Resources to Promote Mental Well-Being For Providers: Psychological First Aid (PFA) Cheat Sheet PFA Coping Infographic PFA Core Skills Infographic  PFA Grounding Infographic   For Leadership: PFA Core Skills for Managers PFA Coping Infographic  PFA Grounding Infographic

This FAQ document encompasses all of the frequently asked questions from the Telehealth Learning and Consultation (TLC) Tuesdays series.   Author(s): Roberts, H., Higgins, W., Franta, E., Chadwell, M., Clarke, B.L., Robinson, L./MMI and Mid-America MHTTC