Reports on efforts by the Minnesota Heart Health Program to develop a system that permitted tracking educational program contacts, its implementation, and its use to make management decisions about program activities. (JOW)

Describes recent professional developments having an increased impact on provision of social work mental health services to children: the emergence of practice guidelines from government and disciplines, the growth of empiral research evidence documenting efficacy of selected interventions, and the impact of managed care programs. Reviews…

Discusses development and evaluation of community-based, telephone intervention suicide prevention centers. Reviews evidence regarding effectiveness of these centers and presence of causal relationship between crisis counseling exposure and suicide rate reduction. Offers cautions and recommendations. Examines model of health promotion program…

Claims counseling psychologist faces many challenges when choosing to work in community mental health center setting. Claims as early professional, the obstacles of immense paperwork and shrinking dollars translating into increased caseload allow for rich although costly training/professional experience. Discusses pros and cons within the context…

Reviews some contraceptive education programs designed for adolescents that differ in educational process based on delivery setting. Reviews school-based, community-based, and college/university-based programs and discusses them in terms of their effectiveness, potential, and limitations. Notes that educational accountability in each setting…

Describes the four steps used by Bethesda Family Service Foundation to help troubled youth break out from the hurt-hate-harm cycle. Healing involves the following steps: (1) Admission and Grieving; (2) Confrontation and Disclosure; (3) Forgiveness and Reconciliation; and (4) Restoration and Healing. Improvement in emotional response can lead to…

A decrease in the average stay in mental health programs has changed the delivery of art therapy services. Article presents strategies for utilizing six prestructured art elements (magazine pictures, magazine words, photocopied images, cut and torn paper, traced shapes, and partial drawings) as a means of addressing these trends. Treatment sources…

A statewide effort in Arkansas to promote low-cost mammograms required community-based education for adult learners. It combined health education, learning styles, brain hemisphericity, anthropology, and the presentation of culturally appropriate role models. (Author/JOW)

School mental health programs are increasingly prominent in the United States and in other countries, but funding remains tentative. This article describes a partnership between a school mental health program and an outpatient mental health center, and considers the larger goal of promoting sustainability and increasing revenue. Issues related to…

It is the era of evidence-based practices. Now more than ever, social programs are challenged to clearly describe their ideal frameworks and empirically demonstrate fidelity to their standards. In this study, the authors implemented a narrative approach to developing standards in a peer support program for people accessing mental health services.…

There are many challenges to transporting evidence-based treatments from laboratories into real-world settings. However, if we hope to make our evidence-based treatments accessible and available to children and usable by community professionals, effectiveness research is imperative. We argue that schools represent an ideal real world setting in…

The greater New Orleans area has yet to fully recover from the effects of Hurricane Katrina, which made landfall on August 29, 2005. One issue of concern in the recovery is the availability of mental health services for children. It is estimated that in 2008 about 187,000 children were living in the greater New Orleans area. Many children in the…

Coordinated school health programs (CSHPs) provide an organizational framework for school health practice by combining health education, health promotion, disease prevention, and access to health services in an integrated, systemic manner. This project examined the effects of a regional 2-year training program to increase local school districts'…

Background: Although models such as the coordinated school health program (CSHP) are widely available to address student health needs, school professionals have been unconvinced that scarce resources should be allocated to improving student health. Concern that attention may be diverted from meeting academic accountability goals is often seen as a…

Unfortunately, racial disparities are well documented in the delivery of behavioral health services. This study examines the effects of implementing a decision support process, integrating clinical information into the administration of mental health services, on racial disparities in psychiatric hospital admissions for children in state custody.…