Thursday, October 10, 2024
10/10/2024
This project will use an innovative, community-driven implementation and evaluation approach to demonstrate that intervening on key social determinants of health domains has the potential to breakdown the social and structural barriers driving persistent, intersectional disparities in mental health outcomes among housing insecure youth who are disproportionately Black, Latino, and have limited-English proficiency. Specifically, we will implement a youth-centered intervention based on bundling evidence-based approaches (expressive arts, health service navigation, and "warm hand-offs") to target social determinants of health in the "Social and Community Context and Economic Stability domains of Healthy People 2030, with the aim of increasing housing insecure youth's use and sustained engagement in preventative health services, including treatment for depression. We aim to demonstrate that the intervention has the potential to reduce intersectional mental health disparities among youth (disparities at the intersection of race, ethnicity, language proficiency, and housing status), with a specific focus on making progress toward Healthy People 2030 Leading Health Indicator (LHI): Increase the proportion of adolescents with depression who get treatment. The proposed demonstration project will accomplish two interrelated goals and make progress towards an expected impact of reductions in intersectional disparities in youth depression and depression-related outcomes (e.g., suicide). Our primary LHI target will be to increase treatment for depression. Our social determinants of focus-community connectedness, social capital, positive coping behaviors, and economic stability-are established protective factors against depression. Goal 1: Increase social connections and social capital, ability to cope with trauma, and economic stability among housing insecure youth. Goal 2: Increase housing insecure youth's access to, use of, and sus tained engagement in preventative health services, including treatment for depression. The project with be equitably co-led by a public health research and evaluation institute within an academic institution: San Diego State University's Institute for Behavioral and Community Health, and a youth-serving community-based organization: San Diego Youth Services (SDYS), which serves 885 housing insecure youth annually across its housing-related programs in San Diego County. Each organization brings the resources, person-power, expertise, and organizational-level commitment that is necessary to accomplish Goals 1 and 2 during the project period, and begin to make progress towards our expected impact. We will focus initial implementation of the intervention and related activities at SDYS' "Storefront" Youth Emergency Shelter for 12 to 17-year-olds, which serves approximately 120 new adolescents annually. Storefront is the only emergency shelter for minors in San Diego County. Once the intervention has been successfully implemented at Storefront, we will implement the intervention in one or more of SDYS' programs serving housing insecure transitional-age youth, with the intention of reaching 18 to 25-years-old in addition to adolescents. Process and outcomes evaluation procedures, as well as monthly feedback from multi-sectoral partners and SDYS Youth Action Board members will be used to continuously monitor quality and impact of the project activities and provide insights for updates and innovations as-needed across the project period.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).
