Peer Supports

Family Voices of North Dakota is a state chapter of the National Family Voices organization and provides health information and education. As part of the Family to Family grant, this chapter has begun to produce <i>Pass It on…Health Care Policy</i>, an e-newsletter that shares resources, information, and activities regarding care for children with special health care needs. Also visit their website for publications, a link directory, and other interactive resources.

The Children with Special Health Care Needs Program developed the outreach materials in October and November of 2004. You will find the radio scripts and sample radio ads for many of the outreach campaigns including: Clinging to Hope, Aphasia, Cleft Lip, PKU, Severe Burns, Heart Defects, Newborn Screenings, Basic 800 info spot, and the Covering Kids and Families Health Care Project. The program aired in both English and Spanish in cooperation with the Nevada Broadcasters Association.

This teleconference was held to allow Family to Family grantees share their expertise and areas of concern. The goal was to learn from the experiences of other grantees. Agenda topics included collaborating with other organizations on webpages, and 211 information lines, how to handle hotline calls in an efficient, yet empathetic manner, and how to effectively collect and use family stories.

Presentation bt Jean Campbell at Oregon Real Choice grant conference in June 2004. Presentation looks at advantages and disadvantages of peer support programs moving to evidence based approaches.

This paper discusses at some length the history of the evolution of self determination and consumer-directed supports. It contains an excellent bibliography of available references.

Report describing methodology and results of Oregon Statewide Survey of Mental Health Drop-In Centers. Survey was commissioned by Oregon Real Choice grantee as part of its efforts to focus on the lack of meaningful choice and self-determination for consumers in the mental health network.

Powerpoint presentation from Oregon conference that addressed issues in mental health. Focus is on consumers' roles in reshaping mental health services to support a recovery model.

This guide is designed to provide states and programs involved in consumer-directed services with a practical handbook on ensuring and improving the quality of services. This guide is based on a philosophy that the views of the major program stakeholders &#150; consumers, families, program staff, regulators, funders &#150; are the necessary starting point for the design of a quality system.

Discussion of evidence-based practices in the mental health arena from the perspective of consumers, many of whom feel that there is a risk to consumer recovery and empowerment when evidence-based practices are funded and encouraged without equivalent funding to innovations coming from the consumers themselves.

SAMHSA newsletter article describing briefly six evidence-based practices that are effective for persons who experience mental illness and which are the focus of SAMHSA's national project on evidence-based practices. Components of the six Evidence-Based Practices toolkits are similar, but the practices themselves are diverse, and they may be unfamiliar to some practitioners and supervisors in the field today.