In This Issue

DMH Office of Communications and Community Engagement

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 Click here to read blog posts by Secretary Bigby, Commissioner Fowler and others

Department of Public Health Blog 

Connections Correction

Massachusetts Association of Older Americans, Inc.

Massachusetts Department of Mental Health

In partnership with:

Elder Services of Merrimack Valley, Inc.

 Hebrew SeniorLife

present:

An Aging & Mental Health Conference

Enhancing the Mental Health

of Older Adults in the Community 

September 20, 2012

8:45 a.m.- 3:30 p.m.

Registration begins 8:00am

Elder Services of Merrimack Valley, Inc

360 Merrimack Street, Building 5

Lawrence, MA 01843

Keynote Presentation:

Advancing Emotional Well-Being in a Multicultural Aging Society

Nancy L. Wilson, M.A., LMSW

Morning Plenary:

David W. Sollars

Ancient Inspirations for Active Older Minds

Activate your own mental healing potential with Chinese Tai Qi, Medical Qi Kung and Acupressure

Participants of this energetic and interactive session will learn powerful, yet easily adaptable time-tested evidence based methods for self-managed solutions for many mood challenges facing older Americans including anxiety, depression and stress with additional symptoms such as restlessness or anne

Afternoon Workshops:

Healthy IDEAS (Identifying Depression, Empowering Activities for Older Adults): Conceptualization to Implementation
Nancy L. Wilson, M.A., LMSW 

Mental Health and Physical Health - Improving Both

Bob Pacl

MOLST's Place in the Advance Care Conversation

(Medical Orders for Life Sustaining Treatment)

Maxa S. Berid, Esq 

Embracing the Journey

Phyllis DeLaricheliere

For more information on the presenters and to Register

  Click here

Conferences and Events

Saturday September 22, 2012

"Recovery is Worth Celebrating!"

The Edinburg Center will hold the Third Annual Rock Into Recovery

12 to 4 p.m. on the Waltham Common, 119 School Street Waltham, MA. Hundreds are expected to attend and learn more about the reality of recovery while listening to the music of The "Grateful Friends" and other musicians. Rock Into Recovery includes live music, arts and crafts, food available for purchase, information and resources about mental health for all ages and fun for the entire family. For more information visit www.edinburgcenter.org or www.rockintorecovery.org 

REGISTER TODAY
Saturday, October 20, 2012
30th Annual NAMI Massachusetts Convention
30 Years of Progress: Shining a Light on Mental Health & Recovery
8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Best Western Royal Hotel and Trade Center 

181 Boston Post Road West, Marlborough

near Interstate 495 

Keynote Speaker: A. Kathryn Power, M.ED., SAMHSA Regional Administrator. 
Click here for the registration form.

WRAP-WELLNESS RECOVERY ACTION PLAN

A workshop for those who experience mental health challenges and those who want to write a WRAP
~ Two Locations ~
September 12, 2012 to November 14, 2012
10 Wednesdays 1:30 to 3 p.m.
MBRLC/THE HOPE CENTER at the Lindemann MH Center, 25 Staniford Street, Boston, Plaza Level
or
October 9, 2012 to December 11, 2012
10 Tuesdays 4 to 5:30 p.m.
MBRLC/Peer Education Resource Center, 3313 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02130

Please contact Sarah Selkovits at 617-788-1034, [email protected] 
Please PRE-register as seating is limited.
WRAP is Mary Ellen Copeland's great system for wellness and crisis planning Learn more at http://copelandcenter.com/ 
This is a 10 week course and you can only miss 2 sessions to be certified

Upcoming Trainings from The Bridge Training Institute

Click here for the complete 2012-2013 training schedule.

Training Institute events are held at the DoubleTree Hotel which is wheelchair accessible to people with mobility limitations. If accommodations such as ASL interpreters or visual aids are needed, please contact Stephen Murphy at [email protected], or 

508-755-0333 three weeks in advance of the training date.

 Upcoming Workshops at the Center for Professional Innovation 

(formerly Community Program Innovations) 

 CPI offers continuing education for mental health and healthcare professionals and educators, holding day-long workshops throughout Massachusetts on clinical and management topics.  Trainings are held in Billerica, Foxborough and Springfield.  To view the complete schedule and to register visit  

 http://bridgewellcpi.org  

All facilities are wheelchair accessible. If accommodations such as ASL interpreters or visual aids are needed, email: [email protected] or call  339-883-2118.

 Click here for the Transformation Center website and all the latest information and events happening throughout the mental health community.   

Please send your event information to

  Michelle Cormier Tallman

by the 15th of each month for publication in DMH Connections

Recovery: A Common Term, An Uncommon Journey

By Anna Chinappi

Department of Mental Health

As we observe Recovery Month this September, there is no doubt that the Department of Mental Health and the mental health community have much to be grateful for. As a family member of one whose life has been changed by mental illness, I also have no doubt that recovery from mental illness can be one of life's biggest game-changers. Recovery is a common term, we use it often. It is at the same time very unique to every individual who experiences recovery and who witnesses it. Recovery can mean many things. But this I know to be true: Recovery allows those qualities of life that we all aspire to embrace can unfold one by one before our eyes: hope, balance, equanimity and compassion for our fellow humans and every living thing. I've seen it and it is a beautiful thing.

Recovery Month is a good time to share hopes, dreams and stories about recovery from mental illness, stories of empowerment, survival and evolution. Here at the Department of Mental Health and throughout our mental health community across the state, there are many stories to share and give witness to and I often have the honor of sharing just a few of these courageous personal accounts here in DMH Connections, like the one below by our colleague Rob Walker.

As we journey on this path, it can sometimes be enlightening to look back at where we've been to help us uncover a gem that we may have missed in our travels. Found recently, here is the "Definition of Recovery" from the Recovery Report written and issued by the National Association of Mental Health Program Directors a decade ago. We hope you agree that this passage from the report continues to ring true today and will continue to serve as a guidepost for future travel down this road together.

Definition of Recovery

From 2002 NASMHPD Recovery Report 

The formal definition of the word recovery means "to get back: regain" or "to restore oneself to a normal state." 

The mental health consumer/survivor movement, which emerged in the early 1970s, gave voice to the notion of mental health recovery and the related emphasis on self-determination and empowerment. Though the term seldom appeared in the professional mental health literature until the late 1980s, it has been embedded in consumer writings, activities and research as early as the 1930s. 

Recovery from mental illness can best be understood through the lived experience of persons with psychiatric disabilities. Ridgway (2001) analyzed four early consumer recovery narratives (Deegan, 1988; Leete, 1989; Lovejoy, 1982; Unzicker, 1989) with a constant comparative method to find common themes. These themes are listed below. 

• Recovery is the reawakening of hope after despair. 
• Recovery is breaking through denial and achieving understanding and acceptance. 
• Recovery is moving from withdrawal to engagement and active participation in life. 
• Recovery is active coping rather than passive adjustment. 
• Recovery means no longer viewing oneself primarily as a mental patient and reclaiming a positive sense of self. 
• Recovery is a journey from alienation to purpose. 
• Recovery is a complex journey. 

Recovery is not accomplished alone-it involves support and partnership. In a review of recovery literature, Ralph (2000b) identified the following four dimensions of recovery found in personal accounts: 

• Internal factors: factors that are within the consumer, such as awareness of the toll the illness has taken, recognition of the need to change, insight as to how this change can begin, and the determination it takes to recover; 
• Self-managed care: an extension of the internal factors in which consumers describe how they manage their own mental health and how they cope with the difficulties and barriers they face; 
• External factors: include interconnectedness with others, the supports provided by family, friends, and professionals, and having people who believe that they can cope with, and recover from, their mental illness; and 
• Empowerment: a combination of internal and external factors-where internal strengths are combined with interconnectedness to provide self-help, advocacy, and caring about what happens to ourselves and to others (Ralph, 2000b). 

Recovery: A System and 

an Individual in Parallel

By Rob Walker

DMH External Consumer Engagement Liaison

About 20 years ago, I was in a bad space. I began to hear things that others didn't hear, missed a lot of work and sank into great despair. A year later I was unemployed, disabled and collecting SSDI. This continued for a few years, until I saw an opening for a Computer Instructor with Staff Development at Tewksbury Hospital with DMH. Little did I know that this was the beginning of an important part of DMH recovery history and more importantly, my own recovery history.

I landed that job at Tewksbury and taught computer classes in the Rehab Center. I noticed that I often wasn't teaching as I sat in an empty room. It dawned on me that I could teach patients the same classes I taught to staff. I was too naive to know any better, and just did it. This worked out so well that it gave me another idea: I asked if one of the patients could get paid to help me teach the classes, to both other patients and to staff. To me back then, that just made sense. Today, one would say I was approaching my job in a recovery-centered way, although at the time I didn't know what recovery was for me or for anyone else.

About 10 years ago, I told the person who helped me teach those classes that I had a diagnosis and that I struggled with many of the same issues she did. That was the first time I had told anyone about myself in the workplace. I was awestruck that she thought it was inspiring that a staff member would tell a patient something so very personal.  That was my first realization that sharing your story of recovery could offer hope to others.

A few years later I was hospitalized at McLean Hospital, and when I came back, I let most people I worked with know where I had been. That was the first time I had told almost anyone, even though I had worked at the Department of Mental Health. Almost all were very accepting, with a few people wondering why I would ever reveal that part of myself to anyone.

Six years ago marked another turning point for me when we started to bring in national speakers on subject of recovery to Tewksbury as part of our Staff Development training there. We had the idea to invite both staff and individuals receiving services to sit side-by-side in these trainings, which for us was untried on this large a scale. Something magical started to happen when both staff and individuals receiving services treated each other as colleagues in a shared human experience.

Three years ago, I asked to attend the Certified Peer Specialist class, a first for someone in the DMH Staff Development Department. And when I did, it was another life-changing event. I completed the classes and established a monthly meeting for individuals in peer positions in the North East Area. Peers from different providers in different roles sat down together every month, supported each other and figured out how to make the job and the mental health system better.

Last year I joined what is now the DMH Office of Recovery and Empowerment and my first task involved putting together and leading a consumer panel to analyze the MassHealth Primary Care Clinician plan, which serves more than 200,000 members--a big job and an important one for the recovery philosophy and approach that is now the priority goal for DMH. And the recovery milestones continue. This year, we hired our first Transition Age Youth Peer Coordinator, Alison Hunt. 

In my 14 years with DMH, my professional role has evolved along with my personal growth--from someone who was keeping secrets about my diagnosis while serving in a non-peer position to one that is using my experience, strengths and skills to infuse a person-centered approach for the services provided by the Department.

DMH Research Conference Focuses on Recovery

DMH and the DMH Centers for Research Excellence recently hosted their annual research conference at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. This year's theme was "Relationships and Recovery: Advancing the Research." Attended by more than 100 providers, administrators, consumers, researchers and family members, the day began with welcome remarks from Commissioner Marcia Fowler and Interim Deputy Commissioner of Clinical and Professional Services Debra Pinals, M.D. After discussing the importance of consumer voice in research, researchers from the UMMS Center for Mental Health Services Research and the Harvard Commonwealth Research Center presented on the role of relationships in treatment settings and the value of peer relationships to recovery for adolescents and young adults.

Presentations from this year's conference can be found at the UMMS Center for Mental Health Services Research website.  

This year's conference was particularly significant as it was the first time all planning, organization and execution of the conference was spearheaded by the Research Centers' Consumer Councils - the UMMS MHE & You Community and the Harvard Consumer Advisory Board.  If you are interested in the Consumer Councils and/or planning for the 2013 DMH Research Conference please contact Jack Grillo or Larry Seidman.

DMH Northeast-Suburban Area Holds Annual Quality Management Symposium: "Promoting Recovery through Research and Practice"

  

Jennifer Gottlieb

More than 150 people attended the DMH Northeast-Suburban Area's Annual Quality Management Symposium "Promoting Recovery through Research and Practice" at Middlesex Community College in Bedford recently.  Following opening remarks by DMH Northeast-Suburban Area Director Susan Wing, the audience heard a keynote presentation on "Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Persons with Serious Mental Illness:  Intervention Development, Research and Practice" by Jennifer Gottlieb, PhD, Research Assistant Professor, Boston University Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation.  

The event also included a poster session with 14 posters and four workshop presentations by local experts from providers, DMH and the peer community on innovative practices being implemented across the Area. The day concluded with closing remarks by Karen Kieffer, coordinator of Peer Services in the Rehab Department at Tewksbury Hospital.  

Debra Pinals, M.D. presents former Deputy Director of Forensic Operations Paul Benedict with the Fein Award at the conference.

Situations like this in forensic evaluations of persons from diverse cultures were the focus of the recent Department of Mental Health (D

MH) Annual Forensic In-Service Training at the Hoagland-Pincus Campus of the University of Massachusetts Medical School. The annual training has been offered to 

all of the state's public-sector forensic mental health examiners since 1986. Forensic mental health examiners perform evaluations in the Commonwealth's District and Juvenile court clinics, as well as the state's adult and child forensic inpatient programs.  

The day's program was introduced by Debra Pinals, M.D., DMH Acting Deputy Commissioner for Clinical and Professional Services and Forensic Assistant Commissioner, who offered observations on adolescents and families from other countries and cultures appearing for court-ordered forensic evaluations. They represent widely diverse backgrounds from many regions across the globe including northern and sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and Asia, to name several.  

The training featured a keynote address by Ezra Griffith, M.D., a national leader in forensic psychiatry and Deputy Director of Diversity and Organizational Ethics at Yale School of Medicine. Dr. Griffith spoke on how one conveys to the court the manner in which cultural differences are related to a person's behavior about which the court must make a decision. Psychological tests, psychiatric diagnoses and forensic research often are not enough for this purpose. The key is in the examiner's sensitivity to learn the culture-based world view of the individual. For 

Dr. Griffith, this must influence how the examiner shapes the "narrative" in the forensic report and testimony to the court. It is the difference between describing a "case" of an "alleged offender" and describing a person in a cultural context as best the examiner understands it.  

Former DMH Assistant Commissioner for Forensic Mental Health Services Robert Kinscherff, Ph.D., Esq., right, received the Barnum Award.

Massachusetts is recognized as having one of finest public-sector forensic mental health evaluation systems in the country. This is due in no small part to its continuing efforts to renew the education of its forensic clinicians and its dedication to persons with behavioral health problems from diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds. 

DMH's Ellie Shea-Delaney Receives Transformation Center's 2012 Ally Award

By Deborah Delman, Executive Coordinator, Transformation Center 

The Transformation Center presented the 2012 Ally Award to DMH's Ellie Shea-Delaney, Assistant Commissioner for Program Development and Interagency Planning. The Ally Award comes from the idea that an ally is vital to the work of the people who are part of the Transformation Center.  Our Taskforce on Accessible Peer Support-we call it TAPS-has learned a great deal from the efforts of LaVerne Saunders and from each other about our differences and how we can be allies for each other. 

Our society is often challenging for groups of people who are de-valued because of a perceived difference. That difference could be in language, in sexual identity, in culture, or in any other way. We are learning to be true allies to a person or group that is different from our own. We are learning that we have to 

• Listen without judgment or correction to members of that group as they share their experience, vision and leadership
• And listen with our hearts as well as our minds until we fully understand
• Stand by the leadership of the members of that group in the face of discrimination and hurt and not to be  just a bystander, but to wholeheartedly pitch in

As people with mental health conditions, these principles are guiding us to break down the language and culture and identity barriers that exist within our own peer communities. The Ally Award is an opportunity for us to recognize a person who not only understands the value of our leadership but also and most importantly listens with the heart as well as mind to our views and experience and works wholeheartedly for positive change so that people with mental health conditions can be true and full participating members of their communities.

We first me Ellie when she was leading Executive Office of Elder Affairs as Secretary where she worked diligently across agencies and constituencies. In 2008 Ellie joined DMH leadership and represented Massachusetts at a trauma-informed care conference. The Transformation Center was part of the team. During this conference the group was inspired to take on the project of making a turnaround in how mental health staff can better help a person who uses self-injury. We decided that we could guide staff to offer warm, personal connection with a person at those most distressing times. When the conference was over, Ellie took our ideas and within two weeks she had organized meetings and found the support to transform the idea into action. The project is taking off now and expanding after careful groundwork and diligence.  

Ellie is also committed to incorporating Peer Specialists in new kinds of Medicaid-funded health and mental health care. We are all grateful for the inspired work of Ellie Shea-Delaney on behalf of people living with mental health conditions. She is a true ally in our cause.   

Board members from The Transformation Center present Ellie Shea-Delaney, center, with her award. They chose a lighthouse representing the "beacon of light" that she has been to the organization.

UMass Research You Can Use

Informed Consent and the Clinician-Client Relationship

Charles W. Lidz, PhD, Paul S. Appelbaum, MD, & Alan Meisel, JD

The UMass Center for Mental Health Services Research is pleased to present our most recent Research You Can Use, Informed Consent and the Clinician-Client Relationship. Feel free to share this product with family members, friends, co-workers, and acquaintances on Facebook and Twitter.

Research You Can Use is part of the Center for Mental Health Services Research Dissemination Series, a collection of products that translate mental health research findings into concise, user-friendly information that is accessible to all.

Visit the Center for Mental Health Services Research

 Left to right, the assistance dogs Mahoney, Flynn and Merlin struck a pose -- and waited for treats, as they greeted guests touring the adolescent unit at the WRCH Grand Opening. They will serve as loyal friends and companions to the patients who come into the unit.

If you have photos from a DMH event that you would like featured as photo of the month or on the site, please send them to Michelle Cormier Tallman