Letters from the CEO: December 2007
Dear National Council Member:
My last letter described the National Council’s recent policy successes — capped off by the introduction of the Community Mental Health Services Improvement Act. Each milestone we achieve moves us further along towards our shared vision of a nation where everyone has access to safe, effective, patient-centered, timely, efficient, and equitable community mental health and addictions prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation services; and a time when all adults and children are free of mental illnesses and addictions.
Achieving the vision, even making incremental steps, isn’t easy and won’t happen without the leadership of National Council members working in partnership with other stakeholders — consumers and their families, policy makers, researchers, and sister advocacy groups — in local communities, in states, and on Capitol Hill. And National Council members can be counted on as good partners that embrace a broad social responsibility beyond the direct provision of services.
And our members’ sense of responsibility extends to their national association, the National Council. They expect from us what they expect from themselves, a commitment to an assertive policy agenda that supports recovery for those with mental illnesses and addictions; a commitment to practice improvement and innovation; and a commitment to building strong communities. And consistent with those expectations, I’m pleased to describe two new National Council initiatives.
Project Helping Hands
The National Council launched Project Helping Hands when Hurricane Katrina ravaged the U.S. Gulf Coast in August 2005 — to help meet emergency mental health needs in the aftermath of the storm. With generous donations from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, we gave immediate, emergency grants to provider organizations in Louisiana, Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Texas.
Provider organizations used Project Helping Hands grants to pay treatment staff; for housing and food; for communications equipment and vehicles; to set up emergency outreach offices; to help staff and consumers repair their homes; and on and on.
In 2007, the National Council surveyed providers in and around New Orleans and the results highlighted insufficient numbers of staff and increasing instances of mental illnesses and addiction disorders among the residents. With additional donations from AstraZeneca, the National Council launched the second phase of Project Helping Hands to help meet the ongoing crisis.
And then we extended Project Helping Hands beyond the Gulf Coast to help meet emergency mental health and addictions service needs in the wake of disaster in any community. To date we’ve provided emergency grants to help in Greensburg, Kansas after the May tornado; in Minnesota and Ohio after the August flooding in the Midwest; and in Utah in the wake of the mine disaster.
Floods in the Midwest, fires in southern California, children in Iraq orphaned by the war, families in Afghanistan torn apart by the upheavals…the list goes on. And every disaster takes it toll on communities — on people with pre-existing mental illness and addictions and on those who are traumatized anew by the disaster and on the staff of organizations that provide treatment and rehabilitation and are among the first responders in any disaster.
We have neither the deep pockets of FEMA or the Red Cross nor their bureaucratic rules and regulations; and most importantly we have member organizations and their staff on the ground that know and are committed to their communities. Project Helping Hands steps in to help — quickly and simply.
Now as the holiday season gets underway, we ask that everyone reading this letter consider donating to Project Helping Hands. So many of us have so much, please make a tax-deductible contribution at www.TheNationalCouncil.org/HelpingHands. For additional information, contact Meena Dayak, Director of Marketing and Communications, at MeenaD@thenationalcouncil.org.
Mental Health First Aid
Fear is often the basis of stigma and discrimination. People are fearful when they don’t understand, they’re fearful of doing or saying the “wrong” thing and of not knowing how to help.
When someone is physically ill or injured, First Aid is administered before medical treatment can be obtained. Mental Health First Aid is the emotional equivalent — assistance provided to a person developing a mental health problem or experiencing a mental health crisis.
Mental Health First Aid is a 12-hour certification course that gives participants the knowledge and skills to help an individual experiencing a mental health problem or crisis. Just as with First Aid or CPR, in Mental Health First Aid, participants learn to assess a situation, to select and implement appropriate interventions, and to help the individual in crisis connect with appropriate care.
And the National Council is bringing Mental Health First Aid, introduced in Australia in 2000 and auspiced by ORYGEN Research Centre at the University of Melbourne, Department of Psychiatry, to the United States.
Well researched, Mental Health First Aid has been replicated in six countries, including Scotland, Great Britain, and Canada. This program gives primary care providers, educators, human resource specialists — the citizens of a community — the tools to overcome fear and to help. Mental Health First Aid has the potential to vastly increase U.S. rates of mental health literacy.
Mental Health First Aid is slated to launch in May 2008 in selected member communities, and we will start by training staff from selected member organizations later this winter. Our vision is that by the year 2025, Mental Health First Aid certification will be as common and as well known as CPR and other first aid certifications.
For more information about Mental Health First Aid and details about participating, contact Lea Ann Browning McNee, the National Council’s Outreach and Development Officer at LeaAnnBM@thenationalcouncil.org.
Project Helping Hands and Mental Health First Aid are about giving to communities — helping in a crisis, responding to a disaster, and ensuring that our neighbors are literate about mental illnesses. Both projects support National Council members in their work and in their efforts to build strong communities.
Please donate to Project Helping Hands at www.TheNationalCouncil.org/HelpingHands.
And please be in touch, I very much look forward to hearing from you.
Best Regards,
Linda
