Background And Objectives: In conversations about expanding age-friendly ecosystems, the concept of "age-friendliness" has not been explored in relation to residential settings.
Research Design And Methods: This multiple-case study compared four residents' perspectives on the age-friendliness of a retirement and assisted living community, combining individual semi-structured interviews with observational data and organizational document analyses in a contextualist thematic examination.
Results: Three themes depict (A) existing experiences of the setting as "age-friendly" and the tension of the built design vs.
Nurse-social worker collaborative interactions in long-term care settings have received limited attention. This qualitative thematic study of 23 participants (11 social workers and 12 nurses) at an urban retirement and assisted living community explores experiences of collaborative work. Two themes of contrasts in responding to resident complexity and contrasts in peer-to-peer work highlight four subthemes reflecting: (a) social workers' orientation toward resident self-determination, requisite care, and advocacy; (b) nurses' orientation toward resident safety, tasks, and clinical outcomes; (c) social workers' devalued professional identity; and (d) nurses' attribution of collaborative challenges to individuals.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: This paper describes the protocols for a randomized controlled trial using a parallel-group trial design that includes an intervention designed to address social isolation and loneliness among people experiencing homelessness known as Miracle Friends and an intervention that combines Miracles Friends with an economic poverty-reduction intervention known as Miracle Money. Miracle Friends pairs an unhoused person with a volunteer "phone buddy." Miracle Money provides guaranteed basic income of $750 per month for 1 year to Miracle Friends participants.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Soc Distress Homeless
January 2022
In the wake of COVID-19, programs for housing homeless individuals in hotels have emerged in the U.S., though research has yielded little information about the impact of these programs on participants expressed in their own words.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDespite increasing efforts to improve housing stability, research has largely defined housing stability in a narrow sense and heavily relied on objective measures, such as housing types and housing duration. The present study constructed a conceptual framework for a subjective housing stability definition from the perspectives of individuals with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders and their behavioral health service providers. Following the principles of grounded theory, we collected and analyzed qualitative data through semistructured interviews with 24 individuals with serious mental illness and substance use problems and three focus groups with 22 behavioral health service providers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFImproving interactions between first responders and individuals experiencing behavioral crisis is a critical public health challenge. To gain insight into these interactions, key informant qualitative interviews were conducted with 25 Chicago stakeholders. Stakeholders included directors and staff of community organizations and shelters that frequently engage first responders.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRapid rehousing (RRH) is an intervention that is being adopted nationally to assist adolescents and emerging adults who are homeless. RRH provides short-term rental assistance for independent scattered-site housing, in addition to an array of support services for approximately 12-24 months. The aim of this study is to explore the experiences of young adults (18-23 years old) who had previously been homeless and who were enrolled in RRH programs set in two urban Northeastern cities, and their subsequent preparedness for independent living.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives Emergency departments (EDs) serve as a health care "safety net" and may be uniquely suited to screening for and addressing patients' unmet social needs. We aimed to better understand patient perspectives on ED-based screening and interventions related to housing instability, as a step toward improving future efforts. Methods We present findings from a qualitative study using in-depth, one-on-one interviews with ED patients who had become homeless in the past 6 months.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis qualitative study examines the notion of home as it relates to place making, belonging, and community building. Using a phenomenological method of inquiry, data were gathered through in-depth qualitative interviews with 15 Somali Americans and subjected to transcendental phenomenological analyses. Three major themes were found: (1) the meaning of community: being Somali and Muslim; (2) "We help each other.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBJPsych Bull
October 2020
Research on the bi-directional relationship between mental health and homelessness is reviewed and extended to consider a broader global perspective, highlighting structural factors that contribute to housing instability and its mental ill health sequelae. Local, national and international initiatives to address housing and mental health include Housing First in Western countries and promising local programmes in India and Africa. Ways that psychiatrists and physicians can be agents of changes range from brief screening for housing stability to structural competence training.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFLittle is known about long-term fidelity of evidence-based interventions (EBIs) under changing conditions. This study examines how staff at 'mature' (eight or more years in operation) Housing First (HF) programs strategize to sustain EBI fit in different geographic areas in the Mid-Atlantic/Northeastern United States. Six focus groups (FGs) at three purposively selected HF programs were conducted with separate FGs for case managers and supervisors at each site.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The population of older homeless substance-using adults is growing considerably, and we sought to understand how such individuals gain control of problematic substance use amidst other life problems.
Unlabelled: : Data were collected in an NIMH-funded study in which four in-depth interviews were conducted over 18 months with formerly homeless adults living in permanent supportive housing. The study subsample was comprised of 15 predominantly African American individuals over age 45 who were in recovery for at least six months.
Background: Practice facilitation is an implementation strategy used to build practice capacity and support practice changes to improve health care outcomes. Yet, few studies have investigated how practice facilitation strategies are tailored to different primary care contexts.
Objective: To identify contextual factors that drive facilitators' strategies to meet practice improvement goals, and how these strategies are tailored to practice context.
Objective: This paper examines how formerly homeless adults with serious mental illness living in Housing First (HF) and "treatment first" (TF) supportive housing programs experience employment. Research questions include: How do these individuals experience employment in the context of their mental health recovery? What do they perceive as the benefits of and obstacles to attaining employment? Are there programmatic differences in their employment experiences?
Method: Case study analyses of data from a federally funded qualitative study were conducted of 40 individuals purposively sampled from HF and TF programs. Data were independently analyzed and consensually discussed to develop cross-case themes.
Objectives: Emergency departments (EDs) frequently care for patients who are homeless or unstably housed. One promising approach taken by the homeless services system is to provide interventions that attempt to prevent homelessness before it occurs. Experts have suggested that health care settings may be ideal locations to identify and intervene with patients at risk for homelessness, yet little is known even about the basic characteristics of patients who might benefit from such interventions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDespite a legally-mandated right to shelter and extensive outreach efforts, an estimated 3,675 homeless individuals were living on the streets of New York City in 2018. Through interviews with 43 unsheltered homeless individuals in the borough of Manhattan (age range 21-74 years), this qualitative study examined barriers they face in accessing housing and other services as well as experiences surviving on the street. Through thematic analysis of the interview data, the most common barriers found were obtaining required identification documents, lack of accessibility of shelters amid complex healthcare needs, waiting as part of the process, and exclusion of pets from shelters and housing options.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Objectives: Adults who have experienced chronic homelessness are considered to be "old" by age 50 due to accelerated aging. While permanent supportive housing (PSH) has been found effective for these individuals, there is limited focus on the needs of adults "aging in place" in PSH. This study examined (1) how older adults in PSH identify and rank their life priorities, (2) how they describe these priorities in their own words, and (3) how life course adversity deepens an understanding of these priorities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe relationship between personal choice and mental health recovery in the context of supported housing has not been explored. To gain an understanding of how choice facilitates recovery processes in supported housing environments for those with serious mental illness (SMI). Qualitative in-depth interviews were conducted with 24 tenants with SMI living in supported housing.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis report explores the nature and quality of social ties of formerly homeless individuals in recovery from serious mental illness and substance abuse and how these ties relate to experiences of community. Using grounded theory and cross-case analysis techniques, we analyzed 34 qualitative interviews conducted with predominantly racial/ethnic minority individuals receiving mental health services. Participants described a range of involvement and experiences in the mental health service and mainstream communities indicating a combination of weak or strong ties in these communities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn this study, we examined the nonkin support networks of orphaned adolescents participating in a family-based economic-strengthening intervention in HIV-impacted communities in Uganda. We analyzed data from a cluster randomized experimental study for orphaned adolescents aged 11-17 years. Participants were randomly assigned to either the control condition, which received bolstered standard of care (BSOC) services, or the treatment condition, which received BSOC services plus an economic-strengthening intervention.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis qualitative study examines the delivery of person-centered care in Medicaid-funded supportive housing for adults with serious mental illness. While much work has been done to promote the uptake of a person-centered approach in healthcare, less is known about how this approach functions in homeless services and supportive housing where many individuals with mental health issues receive rehabilitative services. A total of 84 semi-structured interviews were collected from a purposeful sample of 35 frontline providers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt J Ment Health Nurs
June 2018
The overall aim of this study was to explore the experiences of people with psychiatric disabilities living as tenants in independent, supported apartments for the first time. Supported housing provides an alternative to structured, custodial housing models, such as foster homes, or board-and-care homes, for clients in public mental health systems. This article reports findings on how leadership emerged among tenants after making the transition from custodial to supported housing.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHealth Soc Care Community
March 2018
The objective of this study was to examine the experience of loneliness among people with psychiatric disabilities after moving from custodial housing, including group homes, boarding homes, and family-type residences to independent, supported apartments in the community. Qualitative research methods guided by a naturalistic/constructivist framework were used. Data collection occurred between May 2014 and July 2015 and consisted of individual semi-structured interviews with 24 tenants residing in five supported housing sites across three Canadian provinces; interviews were also conducted with a designated family member for each tenant and with their service providers.
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