Trauma-focused treatment and services for greater houston's children and adolescents - memorial hermann health system (MHHS), is the largest, non-profit, integrated health system in greater houston,…

Trauma-focused treatment and services for greater houston's children and adolescents - memorial hermann health system (MHHS), is the largest, non-profit, integrated health system in greater houston, serving over 2 million patients across 320 sites in southeast texas. Our 14 hospitals, anchors within their respective communities, cover houston's metropolitan service area with a population of 6.37 million. MHHS' behavioral health services (BHS) provides quality behavioral health services to children, adolescents, and adults through a continuum of programs that span 11 hospitals and over 13 community settings. Almost 50% of our patient population is uninsured and low-income. We offer trauma-informed care focusing on medicaid, uninsured/low-income, at-risk children and adolescents living in our four county catchment area: harris, montgomery, brazoria and fort bend. Our grant program provides a continuum of services from screening and comprehensive assessment to treatment and prevention to our target population. We capitalize upon the patient flow from our emergency departments, our mental health crisis clinics, and other BHS program. Grant-funded trauma-focused behavioral health clinicians will be embedded into our mental health crisis clinics, benefit from the existing interdisciplinary care team, to offer trauma-informed care to at-risk children and youth. We leverage technology to offer in-person or virtual care. Referrals will be generated from our partners, which include the harris center and TRI-county behavioral health (local mental health authorities) and three school districts (humble, spring branch and new caney isds). Our overall goal is to increase access to trauma-informed care for vulnerable children and adolescents and improve patient symptomology. Our grant objectives over the five year period are: 1) to screen 5,000 children and adolescents across our health system for current or historical trauma; 2) to enroll and treat 625 children and adolescents using trauma focused- cognitive behavioral therapy (TF-CBT) or trauma and grief component therapy (TGCT) to reduce patient symptomology by 20%; and 3) to offer 2 educational sessions per year targeting parents at our partner schools to help them understand trauma and what steps they can take to prevent trauma in their children. We dedicate time for outreach and to engage new stakeholders to ensure our community is informed of this invaluable grant program.