Mental
Health: Systems Transformation
VIRGINIA
Grant
Information
Name of Grantee
Virginia Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse
Services
Title of Grant
Transforming
Virginia's
Mental Health Services System
Type of Grant
Mental
Health: Systems Transformation
Amount of Grant
$300,000
Year Original Funding
Received
2004
Contact
Information
James M. Martinez, Jr., Director
Office of Mental Health
1220 Bank Street,
10th Floor
Richmond, VA
23219
804-371-0767
jim.martinez@co.dmhmrsas.virginia.gov
Subcontractor(s)
Virginia Organization of Consumers Asserting Leadership (VOCAL)
Mental Health Association of Virginia
Target
Population(s)
Adults with serious mental illness.
Goals
- Assure the State's
mental health system transformation and restructuring are based on
principles of self-determination, recovery, and empowerment.
- Align the State's
existing Medicaid Rehabilitation Option mental health services with the
evidence-based practices of Assertive Community Treatment (ACT), Illness
Management and Recovery (IMR), and Supported Employment (SE) to the
maximum extent possible.
- Maximize opportunities
for peer specialists and consumer-operated programs to provide Medicaid
reimbursable services and evidence-based practices, including a potential
new adult peer support Medicaid service.
Activities
- Develop and implement an
advanced consumer empowerment and leadership training (CELT) academy.
- Develop a recovery Web
site within the Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and
Substance Abuse Services (DMHMRSAS) and Virginia Organization of Consumers
Asserting Leadership (VOCAL) housing resources to educate stakeholders.
- Conduct surveys to
evaluate the recovery orientation of mental health providers and staff.
- Provide training and
technical assistance to community mental health staff, peer specialists,
and other stakeholders on Medicaid reimbursement that supports the State's
Programs for Assertive Community Treatment (PACT) expansion.
- Review and analyze
federal and state regulations pertaining to vocational and employment
services.
- Resolve inconsistencies,
gaps, and potential barriers between the state's evidence-based practices
of IMR and SE implementation toolkits and existing funding streams.
- Provide training to
mental health and vocational rehabilitation partners, including consumers
and other stakeholders, on the evidence-based practices of IMR and SE.
- Identify national models
and state-specific information about peer specialist and consumer-operated
programs, and their roles in the delivery of community mental health
services.
- Resolve inconsistencies,
gaps, and barriers to peer support and identify
opportunities to provide peer specialist and consumer-operated programs in
the state's existing Medicaid Rehabilitation Option community mental
health services and evidence-based practices.
Abstract
The Virginia DMHMRSAS will use the grant project to
strengthen the capacity of the State's mental health services system to provide
integrated community services that embody self-determination, recovery, and
empowerment. The project will focus on consensus and partnership building with
multiple stakeholders and constituencies to develop (1) state-specific models
of illness management and recovery and supported employment; (2) regulatory
analysis and agency funding streams that will support programs on assertive
community treatment, illness management and recovery, and supported employment
services; (3) provider training, consultation, and technical assistance; and
(4) process evaluation of project implementation.
Project activities are intended to increase the number of
mental health consumers who assume policy, planning, evaluation, and leadership
functions and roles at Community Services Boards and in mental health system
transformation activities; provide Community Mental Rehabilitative Services
(CMHRS) that include relevant components of IMR and SE; and are better able to
access recovery-oriented and personalized supports leading to competitive
employment and independence. The State estimates that approximately $5 to $10
million of existing CMHRS Medicaid reimbursement will ultimately be redirected
to support more effective and efficient recovery-oriented community mental
health services and supports.
Grant activities were developed collaboratively with
consumers and are responsive to numerous recommendations in the President's New
Freedom Commission on Mental Health Report and Virginia's One Community, the Olmstead
Task Force Report.