Processes and outcomes of a communalization of trauma approach: Vets & Friends community-based support groups.

Veterans often experience challenges related to processing traumatic experiences and community reintegration, yet there is a dearth of research on promising community-driven approaches. This paper describes core processes and outcomes of Vets & Friends (V&F), a community-based support program that promotes veteran reintegration by healing trauma and moral injury using a communalization of trauma (CoT) approach. We conducted focus groups with 23 V&F group members.

Teaching Community Health Needs Assessment to First Year Medical Students: Integrating with Longitudinal Clinical Experience in Rural Communities.

Community health education is especially important for physicians who will practice in rural communities. However, the majority of efforts to teach community and population health in medical school appear in later years and focus on non-rural contexts. This article presents data from a formative evaluation of a newly developed curricular component on population health and community health assessment for first year medical students in a rural longitudinal clinical preceptorship.

Factors contributing to the effective functioning of veterans mental health councils.

Veterans Mental Health Councils (VMHCs) have been established at many Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers to promote recovery and improve mental health services. Though research shows that consumer-led advisory councils may produce a number of positive outcomes, the aspects of implementation critical for VMHC effectiveness have not been identified. The purpose of this study was to identify factors influencing effective functioning of VMHC, including contextual factors affecting council success.

Military Families' Perceptions of Neighborhood Characteristics Affecting Reintegration: Development of an Aggregate Measure.

This pilot study evaluated the validity and reliability of an Experience of Neighborhood (EON) measure developed to assess neighborhood characteristics that shape reintegration opportunities for returning service members and their families. A total of 91 post-9/11 veterans and spouses completed a survey administered at the Minnesota State Fair. Participants self-reported on their reintegration status (veterans), social functioning (spouses), social support, and mental health.

Bhutanese Older Adult Refugees Recently Resettled in the United States: A Better Life With Little Sorrows.

Purpose: This study explores the experiences and adjustment process among older Bhutanese refugees resettled in the United States and identifies their unmet health and social service needs.

Design: This phenomenological study design included the conduction of nine in-depth semistructured interviews in the respondents' native language. The researchers adhered to the steps outlined by Moustakas for data analysis.

Participant experiences in peer- and clinician-facilitated mental health recovery groups for veterans.

Objective: The purpose of the study was to characterize and compare participants' experiences of peer-facilitated versus clinician-facilitated recovery groups for veterans with mental illness.

Method: We analyzed qualitative data from 24 interviews with veterans who participated in mental health recovery groups led by peer or clinician facilitators.

Results: Subtle differences in group structure, participation/communication and utility/relevance between peer- and clinician-facilitated groups were identified.

Between and within-site variation in qualitative implementation research.

Background: Multisite qualitative studies are challenging in part because decisions regarding within-site and between-site sampling must be made to reduce the complexity of data collection, but these decisions may have serious implications for analyses. There is not yet consensus on how to account for within-site and between-site variations in qualitative perceptions of the organizational context of interventions. The purpose of this study was to analyze variation in perceptions among key informants in order to demonstrate the importance of broad sampling for identifying both within-site and between-site implementation themes.

Grounded theory of barriers and facilitators to mandated implementation of mental health care in the primary care setting.

Objective. There is limited theory regarding the real-world implementation of mental health care in the primary care setting: a type of organizational coordination intervention. The purpose of this study was to develop a theory to conceptualize the potential causes of barriers and facilitators to how local sites responded to this mandated intervention to achieve coordinated mental health care.

The Effectiveness of Cultural Adjustment and Trauma Services (CATS): generating practice-based evidence on a comprehensive, school-based mental health intervention for immigrant youth.

A collaborative study of Cultural Adjustment and Trauma Services (CATS), a comprehensive, school-based mental health program for traumatized immigrant children and adolescents, was conducted to generate practice-based evidence on the service delivery model across two school districts. Program effectiveness was assessed by testing whether client functioning and PTSD symptoms improved as a result of 7 separate service elements. An array of clinical services including CBT, supportive therapy, and coordinating services were provided to all students, and an evidence-based intervention for trauma, TF-CBT, was implemented with a subset of students.

Advancing the science of community-level interventions.

Community interventions are complex social processes that need to move beyond single interventions and outcomes at individual levels of short-term change. A scientific paradigm is emerging that supports collaborative, multilevel, culturally situated community interventions aimed at creating sustainable community-level impact. This paradigm is rooted in a deep history of ecological and collaborative thinking across public health, psychology, anthropology, and other fields of social science.

International Family, Adult, and Child Enhancement Services (FACES): a community-based comprehensive services model for refugee children in resettlement.

The development of evidence-based mental health interventions for refugees is complicated by the cultural and linguistic diversity of the participants, and the need to balance treatment of past traumatic experiences with ongoing support during the process of acculturation. In an effort to gather "practice-based evidence" from existing mental health services for refugees, a collaborative study of International Family, Adult, and Child Enhancement Services (FACES), a comprehensive, community-based mental health program working with refugee children, was conducted to describe the program participants and service delivery model and to assess whether participants improved over time as a function of services. Results showed that participants improved, but that the improvement was not related to dosage of services.