The Yakama Nation System of Care (YNSOC) project expands services and integrated care for
Yakama Nation children and youth with severe emotional disturbances (SED) and their families
on or near the Yakama Indian Reservation. By extending partnerships with child-serving
organizations, the project aims to create a system of care that is responsive to children, youth,
and families with SED while attending to the special cultural context of those needs. Over the
course of the four-year grant, the YNSOC expects to reach 500 children, youth, and young adults
with mental health needs who are living on the reservation or are within reservation boundaries.
Partnerships and services are centered on the reservation (a 1,130,000-acre area in southwestern
Washington State), four communities located within the reservation’s boundaries, and five
communities bordering the reservation.
To serve the most people and meet the greatest needs, the YNSOC project centers activities on
five goals. These goals include (1) further integrating behavioral health and other community
services by expanding the Health Commons Project (HCP) to include all Yakama Nation child-serving
agencies, (2) increasing the system’s clinical infrastructure by providing a centralized
intake and referral process through the addition of “care navigators,” (3) increasing clinical
infrastructure to provide home and community-based skills training services to children and
youth with serious emotional disturbances and their families or foster families, (4) partnering
with the Nak Nu We Sha program and the Tiináwit Youth Treatment program to support
children and youth with complex mental and behavioral health needs that exceed the scope of
routine foster home placements, and (5) reducing stigma toward mental illness while addressing
trauma through cultural-based education and an annual trauma-informed care conference that
serves both tribal and non-tribal partner agencies.
The YNSOC will pursue these goals through diverse methods and measures. These include
developing Memorandums of Understandings, expanding information technology systems,
expanding the HCP (adding eight agencies over the grant), developing and implementing whole person
assessments and training, forming and implementing care navigators (expected to serve
400 children and youth over the grant), providing home and community-based skills training
(expected to serve 500 children and youth over the grant), and working with partners in the
support and transition of children and youth with the most severe needs in foster care (expected
to help 40 children and youth transition over the grant). In addition, the YNSOC will continue
the annual trauma-informed conference, which has, in its initial offerings, improved community
awareness, extended access to services, and reduced stigma for mental health care.