Preconference Sessions
PRECONFERENCE WORKSHOP #1
Wednesday, June 2, 8 am to 5 p.m. and will continue on Thursday, June 3,
from 1:30-4:30 p.m. You must attend all 12 hours to receive the MHFA
certification.
Mental Health First Aid (registration fee $100)
The WICHE Mental Health Program will host a preconference
Mental Health First Aid training session. Mental Health First Aid is a
12-hour training course designed to give members of the public key skills to
help someone who is developing a mental health problem or experiencing a
mental health crisis. The growing evidence behind the program demonstrates
that it does build mental health literacy — helping the public identify,
understand and respond to signs of mental illness.
Mental Health First Aiders learn a single strategy that includes
assessing risk, respectfully listening to and supporting the individual in
crisis, and identifying and contacting appropriate professional help.
Trainees are taught how to apply this strategy in a variety of situations,
such as helping someone through a panic attack or with an acute stress
reaction, engaging with someone who may be suicidal, supporting a person
experiencing psychosis and helping an individual who has overdosed. Trainees
are also introduced to the risk factors and warning signs of specific
illnesses such as anxiety, depression, psychosis addiction, and eating
disorders; engage in experiential activities that build understanding of the
impact of illness; and learn information about evidence-supported treatment
programs.
The training will be held from 8am-5p.m. on Wednesday, June 2, and
continue from 1:30-4:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 3. The registration fee for
this pre-conference session is $100 per person. You must attend the entire
12-hour session to receive MHFA certification, which is valid for a period
of three years. Please contact Mimi McFaul with any questions you may have
about Mental Health First Aid at
mmcfaul@wiche.edu.
PRECONFERENCE WORKSHOP #2
Wednesday, June 2 – 1:30 to 4:30 p.m.
Funding Opportunities for Rural Mental Health Research (Registration
fee $50)
Phuong Kim Pham, Ph.D. Health Science Administrator, Rural Mental
Health Research Program, Office for Special Populations, National Institute
of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health
In addition to the National Institute of Mental Health, many
programs/opportunities supporting rural health are available at various
Federal Agencies and private organization. An overview of
opportunities/programs at Federal Agencies will be discussed. A
summary of rural health resources and contacts at various federal agencies
including Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
(SAMHSA), Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), Agency for
Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), US Department of Agriculture (USDA)
on Rural and Community Development and US Department of Veterans Affairs
will be provided.
PRECONFERENCE WORKSHOP #3
Wednesday, June 2, 1:30 to 4:30 p.m.
Estimating the Number of Adults in Need of Behavioral Health Services
and
Developing Indicators of Unmet Need, Disparities in Care, and Workforce
Shortages (registration fee $50)
Chuck McGee, M.A., (WICHE Mental Health Department); Hoang Thanh
Nguyen, Ph.D., (LifeStat LLC); Charlie Smith, Ph.D., Deputy Director
(Colorado Division of Behavioral Health) and Alan R. Ellis, MSW, (Cecil G.
Sheps Center for Health Services Research, University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill)
This workshop will discuss a method for estimating the need for services
based on the prevalence of adults with serious behavioral health conditions.
We will start with a presentation on synthetic prevalence estimates of
adults with serious mental illness (SMI), substance use disorders (SUD), and
co-occurring SMI and SUD disorders. These estimates were based on
epidemiological data from three national surveys included in the
Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiologic Surveys (CPES) and applied to Census
data at the county level.
Two examples using these synthetic prevalence estimates will be explored.
The Colorado Division of Behavioral Health developed indicators of unmet
need and disparities in care by combining prevalence estimates with data on
service use obtained from four State agencies. A national study of
mental workforce shortage areas was conducted by researchers at the Cecil G.
Sheps Center for Health Services Research and funded by the Health Services
Resources Administration (HRSA).
The landscape of prevalence data is changing. Two other
epidemiological surveys are including prevalence estimates useful for
planning purposes, the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS)
and the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH). Findings from
these surveys will be compared with the synthetic prevalence estimates based
on the CPES.
Chuck McGee, M.A., is a Senior Research and Technical Assistance
Associate with the WICHE Mental Health Department. Currently he works
with the fifteen WICHE states to develop performance indicators. He
has worked in quality assurance inside a city government, a comprehensive
community mental health center, and three state mental health authorities.
He has researched, presented, and reported on performance indicators of
unmet need and disparities in care, appropriateness of care, satisfaction
with care, and outcome of receiving services. He leads the Western States
Decision Support Group (WSDSG), a regional division of the federal Mental
Health Statistics Improvement Program (MHSIP); has co-directed developing
culturally competent queries for the MHSIP Consumer Report Card; and
collaborated with state mental health authorities on monitoring the
downsizing of state hospitals. Chuck has evaluated and reported on
state and local programs and provided technical assistance in mental health
evaluation. He has presented at national MHSIP conferences and at
regional and state meetings
Hoang Thanh Nguyen, Ph.D., is currently a managing member of LifeStat
LLC, a professional consulting firm. He has a long standing interest in
psychiatric epidemiology. At the University of Texas Medical Branch, he
worked with an inter-agencies team to conduct a randomized treatment trial
for adults with severe and persistent mental illness to address the waiting
list problem due to lack of beds in psychiatric units. As a consultant with
Macro International, he examined the relationships between services, costs,
and outcomes for the National Evaluation of Systems of Care for Children
with Serious Emotional Disturbance. Dr. Nguyen has over 65 peer-reviewed
abstracts and articles, and he continues to be active in the services
research community.
Alan R. Ellis, MSW, is a Research Associate and Fellow at the Cecil G.
Sheps Center for Health Services Research, University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, where he works in the Program on Mental Health and Substance
Abuse Systems and Services Research. A native of Durham, North
Carolina, Mr. Ellis was educated at Dartmouth College (BA in computer
science and
Spanish) and at UNC (MSW). He has also completed the required
coursework for a doctoral degree in social work. Mr. Ellis has been
working with health and human services data since 1994. He has
participated in many aspects of social science research, including study
design, instrument design, data collection, database design and management,
analysis, and dissemination. Mr. Ellis has analyzed data on depression
treatment outcomes; serious mental illness; substance use; posttraumatic
symptoms; autism; managed care; caregiver stress; access to and utilization
of mental health and disability services; service system integration; and
mental health need, workforce, and workforce shortage. Current
research interests include health disparities, children's mental health,
multilevel modeling, and propensity scoring methods.