Products and Resources Catalog

This infographic summarizes how discrimination and acculturation stress affects Hispanic and Latino children and youth mental health and the reasons for seeking mental health services. It also covers three promising evidence-based interventions that address the mental health needs of Hispanic and Latino children and youth. English and Spanish versions are available.

En esta infografía se resume como la discriminación y el estrés de aculturación afecta a los niños y jóvenes hispanos y latinos, también las razones para buscar servicios de salud mental. El documento incluye tres intervenciones prometedoras basadas en evidencia que aborda las necesidades de salud mental en esta población.

This document informs about the importance of students' mental health in school, the provision of school mental health services, and the role of social workers in the school setting. It also covers key elements for understanding and engaging Hispanic and Latino students and families into mental health care. 

The infographic highlights factors contributing to stress among Hispanic and Latino communities due to racial and ethnicity discrimination.

Every year we celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month and make strides to helping the broader U.S. society learn more about Hispanics as a group. This is important and we should continue to do so. But to truly begin to impact the health and mental health inequities impacting Latinx, we must go beyond the three F’s that characterize heritage months: food, fun, and festival. We need to better understand the significant differences in the very diverse Latinx community, from generational, linguistic, and acculturation differences among various Latinx subgroups, to geographic differences across the U.S. We must also truly understand that being Latinx is not sufficient to effectively work with Latinx communities, and that non-Latinx providers, who are the majority of providers, can learn to work effectively with the Latinx community. This 1-hour webinar targeted to Latinx and non-Latinx providers will help us begin to “unpack” Latinx diversity and discuss what this diversity means for service provision in health and behavioral health. At the conclusion of this webinar, participants will be able to: 1. Understand significant differences in the very diverse Latinx community, including generational, linguistic, acculturation, and geographic differences. 2. Discuss challenges in assuming that being Latinx is all we need to effectively work with Latinx clients. 3. List strategies to enlist non-Latinx providers in our efforts to address Latinx health and behavioral health inequities. 4. List strategies for increasing the competency and proficiency of all providers who work with Latinx communities.

This presentation will look at creative intervention strategies to address the continually evolving needs in a newcomer campus that works primarily with Latino students. We will discuss the spectrum of “traditional” mental health services as well as best practices that have been implemented, including the therapy bunny, garden, and restorative circles. An overview of the needs of the school and the students will be presented to provide background on the development and implementation of the intervention strategies. The challenges that have arisen, creative solutions that have been adopted and the unexpected successes will be shared to provide participants strategies that they can implement in their settings.   

Recording of the webinar titled "Suicide and Opioids," originally held on September 25, 2019.   Download the slides

This month: we launch our monthly newsletter, share recordings of hosted webinars, and announce upcoming events. Subscribe to our monthly newsletter here.

On August 22nd, we held a consultation line with Dr. Roscoe Brady and Dr. Matcheri Keshavan, where they addressed specific bipolar-related psychopharmacology questions. 

On August 14th, we held a webinar on "Non-Adherence and its Management in Early Course Psychotic Disorders". Dr. Matcheri Keshavan discussed the causes of non-adherence, approaches to identifying non-adherence, and the management non-adherence in patients in the early course of psychotic disorders. 

In this webinar, we describe a community campaign that we developed and evaluated to reduce the treatment delay of Latinos with first-episode of psychosis. We first review the rationale for early intervention of persons with psychotic disorders, especially for high-risk groups that include Latinos residing in the United States. Then we describe our conceptual model of psychosis literacy that guided our campaign. We also point out how we constructed our campaign message using simple everyday language and how we evaluated the different resources of the campaign regarding efficacy and effectiveness. We then describe the key elements of the two-year campaign and report the evaluation of the campaign. We propose ways to improve future campaigns to reduce treatment delay. Our campaign and other initiatives give us hope that we can ease the suffering of persons with early psychosis and their families.

On July 11th, we held a psychopharmacology consultation line with Dr. Matcheri Keshavan, where he addressed specific psychosis-related psychopharmacology questions. 

Aging is a fact of life and it is frequently accompanied by declining health, but it does not always have to be that way. The aging adult is frequently expected to manifest deficits in cognition, and these deficits can be part of a primary brain degenerative process, a psychiatric illness, or physical disease. These conditions either individually or combined interact with each other, meaning that the presence of one can make the other one worse. Any of these conditions along with other social factors, such as the environment where one is born, lives or works, ethnicity, income, support system, level of acculturation, and the degree of health literacy can facilitate or obstruct access to care and eventually influence health outcomes. This presentation will explain the interaction of these conditions in the Latino elderly, and the known barriers coming from the health system and health disparities perspective. The presentation will close with ideas of what you can do at home while working with the Latino elderly, and with a short video of an older Latino woman who will explain her desire to live in spite of her illnesses. With the Latino aging population growing in the US, it is our turn to promote health messages that resonate with their needs and preferences, such as optimism and acceptance, connectedness, independence, and self-worth.

Dr. Anthony Zazzarino, PhD, LPC, ACS, CPRP is a full-time faculty member at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey in the Department of Psychiatric Rehabilitation and Counseling Professions. He currently provides instruction for professional education courses for New Jersey’s Supported Housing agencies implementing Community Support Services (CSS), the Master’s program in Rehabilitation Counseling, and the Doctoral program in Counselor Education and Supervision. Dr. Zazzarino is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC), Approved Clinical Supervisor (ACS), and Certified Psychiatric Rehabilitation Practitioner (CPRP). He completed his PhD in Counselor Education and Supervision at Walden University where he focused on improving the lives of sexual minorities with serious mental illnesses and enhancing individual’s knowledge of multicultural competence. Dr. Zazzarino is actively presenting at local, state, and national conferences related to psychiatric rehabilitation methods, counseling services, and supervision practices. In addition to his work at Rutgers, Dr. Zazzarino is a suicide prevention trainer for the Society for the Prevention of Teen Suicide, facilitates group therapy for adolescents and adults at an intensive outpatient program, provides outpatient counseling services at his private practice, and provides clinical supervision for counselors who need supervised clinical hours in New Jersey.    Webinar Description and Objectives: Participants will become familiar with the unique needs facing individuals who identify as a sexual minority, enhance awareness of increased rates of mental health symptoms, substance use, and suicidality within this population, and explore effective services for sexual minority individuals. A sexual minority is an individual who identifies with a sexual identity other than heterosexuality.    Define the term sexual minority Identify different sexual orientations Distinguish between sexual and gender identity Explain the importance of the minority stress model Discuss the increase in mental health needs of sexual minorities Illustrate the reasons for an underutilization of services   Access webinar slides. Access webinar recording. 

Hispanics and Latinos' cultural values are essential for a competent mental health services, assessment and treatment.

This presentation by Southeast MHTTC Director, Dr. Ben Druss, and Deputy Director, Dr. Janet Cummings gives an overview of the center's scope of work, areas of focus, and activities. 

Training and Technical Assistance Needs Findings from a Survey of Professionals Who Serve Individuals with Mental Illness in Region 8 The Mountain Plains MHTTC team conducted an electronic survey in March 2019 to identify the mental health technical assistance and trainings needs of Region 8. The survey was distributed electronically to individuals in Region 8 who serve persons with mental illness. Results presented in this report will help the Mountain Plains MHTTC staff better collaborate with providers and stakeholders throughout the region. Additionally, the survey results will inform the development of new products, training materials, and technical assistance requests. The report identifies aggregate training needs as well as state specific requests and variation between rural and urban respondents. Authors Shawnda Schroeder Thomasine Heitkamp

Introducing the Great Lakes MHHTC News, our electronic newsletter! Our premier issue includes an introduction to some of our team members and invites readers to review our needs assessment survey and visit our website.   Great Lakes MHTTC News February 2019

Powerpoint presentation that provides an overview of the New England MHTTC's work.

The World Health Organization has stated the “single most important barrier to overcome in the community is the stigma and associated discrimination towards persons suffering from mental and behavioural [sic] disorders.” In response, researchers collected data in North Dakota utilizing an existing and nationally validated instrument for measuring stigma. This brief presents the results of the survey and implications for communities.   On November 20, 2020, Sage Journals published an article based on this product entitled, "The Role of Rural and Urban Geography and Gender in Community Stigma Around Mental Illness." A subscription may be required for full access. Authors Shawnda Schroeder Thomasine Heitkamp Chih Ming Tan

Overview of the Great Lakes MHTTC School Supplement: Goals Focus areas Staff

This one-page (double-sided) document gives an overview of the Great Lakes MHTTC, our goals, and key personnel. 

In an effort to better understand the needs of providers within Region 5, the Great Lakes MHTTC surveyed providers in the states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Our partner subcontractors in each state (provider associations known as “nodes”) assisted us in sending the survey link to providers within their association e-mail list as well as to other behavioral health providers in their state. This 22 -item survey asked respondents to rank the importance of various training and technical assistance topics from a list of commonly used mental health evidence-based practices.