Catholic Charities Archdiocese of Hartford will establish a Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic at its Instituto de La Familia Hispana (IFH). The project will increase access and improve the quality of community mental health, substance disorder and co-occurring treatment for a primarily Hispanic population of children, youth and adults in Greater Hartford. The CCBHC will provide 24 hour/7 day access to culturally competent, community-based integrated primary and community behavioral healthcare for 350 and 400 unduplicated consumers for the project’s first and second year, respectively, for a total of 750 consumers over the grant period.
IFH will target a population of Hispanic adults with Any Mental Illness (AMI), Serious Mental Illness (SMI), Substance Abuse Disorder (SUD) and Co-Occurring Disorders (COD) and children/adolescents with serious emotional disorders (SED) in Hartford, East Hartford, West Hartford CT. 2019 US Census data shows area total population ages 5 and up of 222,088; 73,774 (35%) are Hispanic of any race and of this group, 74% are Puerto Rican. The target group of Hispanics includes 17,610 children ages 5-17; 49,630 ages 18-64 and 6,474 ages 65+. IFH served 1,991consumers in 2019; 1,632 adults ages 18-59, 155 adults ages 60+ and 204 children ages 4-17; 75% were from Hartford; 22% were white, 14% were Black and 58% other; 81% were Hispanic (of this group, 77% Puerto Rican, 12% other Hispanic, 2% Mexican, 1.3% Cuban, 6% unknown); 94% received Medicaid/Medicare and 5% are uninsured.
Founded in 1975, the IFH is one of the few mental health centers in the U.S. and the only one in Greater Hartford specializing in culturally-specific mental health and substance abuse care for Hispanics. CCBCC Goals/Objectives include: 1) Increase staff capacity to deliver culturally-grounded, effective integrated health, mental health and substance abuse treatment by hiring additional bilingual/bicultural clinical, care management and peer staff and providing training in Motivational Interviewing/Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (MI/CBT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT), Eye Movement Desensitization Therapy (EMDR), Seeking Safety and Familias Unidas; 2) Reduce hospital and emergency department utilization among a target population of adults and youth by providing Mobile Crisis Services (DCO), Open Access and Medication Assisted Treatment. 3) Reduce high risk behavior leading to hospitalization by linking clients to Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) and providing Targeted Case Management services; 4) Improve behavioral symptoms and functioning among children and adults by providing evidence-based outpatient individual and group interventions (TF-CBT, MI/CBT, DBT, EMDR, Seeking Safety and Familias Unidas); 5) Prevent unnecessary medical hospitalizations/ER visits and chronic disease by providing health screening, on site primary care and bilingual pharmacy services and integrated care management; 6) Improve physical and behavioral health among adults by hosting weekly psychosocial rehabilitation/recovery groups; 7) Create project advisory board composed of 51% consumers.