National Council pilots trauma models for primary care

The National Council for Behavioral Health has announced an educational program with support from Kaiser Permanente for community health centers to become trauma-informed practices and models for replication.

"Most people will see a primary care doctor before they will see a mental health or addiction professional," said Linda Rosenberg, president and CEO of the National Council, in a statement. "They are our frontline to mitigating trauma's affect on all of us. Kaiser Permanente's investment in this space will expedite primary care settings' adoption of trauma-informed practices, which we know is the foundation of healing and recovery."

The grant from the Kaiser Permanente National Community Benefit Fund at the East Bay Community Foundation will provide an opportunity for 14 safety-net organizations across the United States to join a yearlong learning opportunity that includes raising awareness of medical conditions caused by trauma and getting effective support and resources for patients who have experienced trauma.

Participating health centers will:

• Adopt trauma-sensitive screening, assessment, and treatment practices that will aid their efforts to successfully treat patients with chronic, uncontrolled health conditions.
• Explore the impact of traumatic life events on a person’s chronic physical health conditions, overall poor health, unhealthy lifestyle behaviors, overuse or underuse of services, and poor self-management.
• Systematically track changes in health indicators for a target population chosen by the health center.

Applications will be made available beginning Monday April 6, 2015.

To learn more about the program, visit www.thenationalcouncil.org/trauma-informed-primary-care-initiative-learning-community.