Get Educated

How can we end homelessness for people with serious mental illnesses?

•  Outreach:  Making services available with a consistent, caring, and personal relationship engage homeless people and make the entire rteatment process much more inviting.

• Integrated mental health and substance abuse treatment: I don’t like this one considering I believe that self induced mental illness through drug abuse should NOT be treated in correlation and on the same level as mental illnesses that can not be self prevented by the person affected.  Lumping these “drug abusers” with people who are seriously and helplessly affected by mental illness seriously skews the statistics and therefore makes the mental illness numbers unrealistically high. 
  

• Supportive services to people in housing:  Will help a community achieve residential stability, an improvement in mental health, and a reduction in the costs of homelessness.

• Prevention. Homelessness among people with serious mental illnesses can be prevented.  Helping people who are being released form mental institutions should have better assistance with their transitions.  This better prepares the individual for re-entrance, or for their first entrance into the community.

[http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/publications/allpubs/homelessness/]

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How can I find and access mental health treatments and services?

Decisions regarding the admission, treatment, and care of people with emotional problems are made at the local and State levels, so the types of available services, and how those services are funded, vary by State. Your State Mental Health Agency will be helpful in telling you what services are available in your State. You may also want to contact local chapters of self-help organizations to learn about other services available in your specific community.

Your doctor or someone at your local mental health center can refer you to a licensed therapist who is registered and affiliated with his/her same professional association. To obtain a referral, you can also contact one of these organizations:

American Psychiatric Association
1000 Wilson Boulevard, Suite 1825
Arlington, VA 22209-3901
(888) 357-7924
www.psych.org

American Psychological Association
750 First Street, NE
Washington, DC 20002
(202) 336-5980
www.apa.org

National Association of Social Workers
750 First Street, NE, Suite 700
Washington, DC 20002
(202) 408-8600
www.naswdc.org

This Mental Health Services Locator may also be of help:
mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/databases/default.asp

[http://mentalhealth.samhsa.gov/publications/allpubs/government/#enhance]

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The best thing a person can do to get involved with the situation of Mental Illness within our society is to get educated. Be understanding and open-minded. It’s my personal opinion the SUPPORT is the best cure for any illness. In order to make your support stronger and more on a group level, there are groups available out there that you can join and become a member of in order to better educate yourself and help those in need as well.

Below is an advertisement for a National Association of Social Workers (NASW) membership, specifically an ad for you to get involved with a specialty practice section of the organization, Poverty and Social Justice. NASW is the largest membership organization of professional social workers in the world, with 150,000 members. They work to enhance the professional growth and development of its members, to create and maintain professional standards, and to advance sound social policies. This particular specialty practice is just one a many that the NASW offers. Another is the Mental Illness section which is ideal for social workers who are interested in policies and practices affecting persons who have or may be vulnerable to mental health disorders, including those served by public settings and agencies. Examples of areas of service: counseling, disaster relief, case management, direct services, advocacy, community mental heath, coordination of care.

If you are not a social worker you can simply check the, Substance Abuse Mental Health Service Administration website, http://www.samhsa.gov/index.aspx, for updates and keep your self informed.