WE ALL HAVE MENTAL HEALTH
Mental Health Community Care Model
Mental health is how we think, feel and act. We all have mental health. Mental health community care is a preventive model of care that equips and empowers all individuals with the ability to provide informal, community-based mental health support.
Informal, community-based support focuses on mental health promotion in order to encourage and increase healthy behaviors, protective factors, and resilience. Through this, we can reduce the risk and impact of mental illness, provide early intervention, and support the process of healing and recovery. Critical to the community care model is collaboration with primary and specialty mental health care providers. Working together helps to ensure everyone has access to informal support as well as formal support when needed.
WE ALL HAVE A ROLE IN SUPPORTING MENTAL HEALTH
Scope of Informal Mental Health Community Care
Informal care consists of knowledge, skills, and behaviors that everyone can learn and do. These include:
Understanding mental health as something we all have—it is how we think, feel, and act
Applying positive self-care practices routinely
Engaging in conversations in a genuine way, with empathy and the intent of building meaningful relationships
Understanding and applying trauma-informed guiding principles when interacting with others
Understanding the impact of social determinants of health and the effects of systemic racism on mental health
Modeling emotion regulation, co-regulation, and effective coping skills
Recognizing signs that someone may be struggling
Connecting individuals to primary and specialty supports when needed
Providing initial response in crisis situations
Initiating dialogue and collaborating with others to embed mental health care supports throughout the community.
All of the actions above are informed by practices found in social-emotional learning, trauma-informed care, and suicide prevention.
Through intentional effort to increase awareness and competence in the above areas, individuals, organizations and communities are better positioned to provide mental health community care.
Informal support is not therapy, nor does it replace formal support (i.e., diagnosis, prescription, and treatment). Informal support complements formal support by reinforcing healthy behaviors, increasing protective factors, and building resilience.
Check out these quick skill-builders to boost your ability to care for yourself and others.
Thank you to the St Mary’s Capstone Team for their help, and to the YUSA Mental Health Innovation Team, Thought Leader Cohort, and all of the Ys working every day to strengthen their communities.