A BRIGHT Approach (to Early Childhood, Parenting, and Substance Use) - ABSTRACT: A BRIGHT Approach to Early Childhood, Parenting, and Substance Use The Institute for Health and Recovery, Inc (IHR), in collaboration with Boston University School of Social Work (BUSSW) and the Supporting our Families through Addiction and Recovery (SOFAR) clinic at Boston Medical Center (BMC), propose “A BRIGHT Approach to Early Childhood, Parenting, and Substance Use” to address the needs of young children suffering from trauma and grief resulting from parental substance and opioid misuse. The program will serve 180 children (24% Black; 49% White; 12% Latino/a; and 15% as mixed race) birth through age 6, (30 in Year 1, 40 annually in Years 2-5) and their parents in recovery from SUD at the SOFAR Clinic. Clinicians and a Peer Recovery mentor will offer BRIGHT and other evidence-based interventions that will result in families affected by substance use and their children affected by the traumas of grief, loss, and separation from parents, to experience increased engagement and joy in the parent-child relationship, while building resilience, mitigating traumatic grief, and optimizing child development. Over 50% of the families served by SOFAR are involved with the child welfare system in MA due to substance use. BRIGHT (Building Recovery through Intervention: Growing Healthier Together), is a unique intervention developed in Massachusetts over fifteen years that builds resilience, recovery and relationship between parents affected by Substance Use Disorders (SUD) and trauma, and their young children, age newborn through 6. Social-emotional competence, built in young children through development of a strong caregiver-child relationship, has been identified as the single most significant component underlying the development of resilience in children. Simultaneously we will offer training in the components of the BRIGHT intervention (scored as an Emerging Practice by the Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs) to build the capacity of SOFAR staff, and staff within Boston Medical Center, as well as our referral sources and child welfare staff, to understand, learn, and replicate key components of the intervention within their practice with recovering families. Goals for this project include: 1) Increase children’s strengths and mitigate effects of parental SUD/MH and trauma; 2) Decrease child trauma by enhancing the quality of the parent-child relationship; 3) Build the capacity of SOFAR Clinic and other BMC staff to provide family-centered, grief focused, trauma-informed care that mitigates the effects of traumatic grief and optimizes child development; 4) Build understanding in the child welfare system of a relationship-based, trauma-informed approach to working with families and young children with histories of substance use, co-occurring disorders and trauma can improve outcome for children; 5) Collaborate with NCTSN- Category II, Treatment and Service Adaptation Centers, to develop, advance, or adapt interventions to improve engagement and outcomes for traumatized young children, including culturally and linguistically appropriate services.
