Vulnerable populations typically present with multiple overlapping issues, such as poverty, substance abuse, mental illness, or other health issues that require varying services and treatments. Service Delivery for Vulnerable Populations, New Directions in Behavioral Health provides students and professionals in health care and service delivery with innovative programs and models to address the needs of these vulnerable populations.

This essential text offers new approaches to program design, service delivery, evaluation, and funding. Strategies for introducing these innovations-such as cross-system coordination and blended funding-are described in detail, using real, evidence-based programs from around the country as examples. Experts from across program delivery systems, as well as from academia and government, share their practice experience.

Table of Contents

• Contributors
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgments

SECTION I. NEW DIRECTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF PERSONS WITH PSYCHIATRIC DISABILITIES

1. Defining Severe Persistent Mental Illness: Implications for Knowledge, Needs, and Services
2. Innovative Programs for Consumers with Psychiatric Disabilities

3. Children, Youth, and Families: Needs and Issues
4. Model Approaches for Children and Youth with Serious Emotional Disturbance: Systems of Care and Wraparound

SECTION III. NEW DIRECTIONS IN SERVICES FOR LGBTQ INDIVIDUALS

5. Sexual Minority Youth: The Heterogeneity of Health-care Needs
6. Sexual Minority Adults: Resiliencies and Vulnerabilities in Health Care

SECTION IV. NEW DIRECTIONS IN HOUSING AND HOMELESSNESS

7. Pathways' Housing First: A Consumer-Driven Approach to Ending Homelessness and Promoting Recovery
8. Homeless Veterans: The Big Picture and the New York Experience
9. Housing for Older Americans

SECTION V. NEW DIRECTIONS IN SERVICES FOR OLDER ADULTS

10. Behavioral Health Issues for Older Adults: Substance Abuse and Psychiatric Disability
11. Elder Abuse: The Hidden Epidemic

SECTION VI. NEW DIRECTIONS IN SERVICES FOR REFUGEES

12. Understanding the Refugee Experience of Trauma
13. Innovative Program Approaches to Refugee Trauma

SECTION VII. NEW DIRECTIONS IN SERVICES FOR THE DISABLED

14. Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
15. Disabled Women and Domestic Violence: Notes from the Field

SECTION VIII. CRITICAL CONSIDERATIONS IN SERVICE DELIVERY

16. Jail Diversion Models
17. Program Evaluation with Vulnerable Populations

18. Mental Health Meets New Media: A Powerful New Portal for Increased Access to Mental Health Services
19. Health Literacy and Human Services Delivery
20. Transformative Impact and Initiatives of the Mental Health Consumer/Survivor Movement
21. The Future of Managed Behavioral Health Care

By:

• Steven Estrine, PhD (Editor)
• Robert Hettenbach (Editor)
• Heidi Arthur, L.M.S.W. (Editor)
• Maria Messina, Ph.D. (Editor)

Reviews:

Alan E. Siegel, Ed.D. Chief, Mental Health Service, MIT Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychology, Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

"[This book is] the perfect primer for anyone seeking to understand the latest trends in psychiatric care for vulnerable people today."

Ted Houghton Supportive Housing Network of New York

"It is rare for a single book to discuss innovative practices that affect such a broad array of vulnerable groups, including children and families, older people and people with severe mental illness. Together, these essays allow readers to identify similarities and differences with regard to the needs of these populations, the conditions that may exacerbate their problems, and the adequacy of the programs and services designed to address their needs. It also may help readers identify lessons from innovations targeted at one group that may be helpful in another policy arena."

Michael K. Gusmano, PhD Research Scholar The Hastings Center

Vulnerable populations typically present with multiple overlapping issues, such as poverty, substance abuse, mental illness, or other health issues that require varying services and treatments. Service Delivery for Vulnerable Populations, New Directions in Behavioral Health provides students and professionals in health care and service delivery with innovative programs and models to address the needs of these vulnerable populations.