Minnesota department of health application for samhsa treatment for individuals experiencing homelessness grant - the minnesota department of health (MDH) is applying for the treatment for individuals…

Minnesota department of health application for samhsa treatment for individuals experiencing homelessness grant - the minnesota department of health (MDH) is applying for the treatment for individuals experiencing homelessness project to improve care for people experiencing homelessness with complex behavioral health needs. MDH's project focuses on minneapolis, saint paul, and duluth, which account for two-thirds of all people experiencing homelessness in minnesota. This project has the advantage of providing services in locations where the focus population is already seeking help. In many cases, these individuals are frequent users of health care services, but struggle to receive appropriate care, stable housing, and services. These individuals have often been banned from local shelters and housing programs and spend much of their time at downtown emergency departments or health clinics as a shelter of last resort. In the twin cities, MDH will partner with the hennepin healthcare emergency department and the minnesota community care downtown clinic. These are fast-paced, high-volume settings where deep engagement and relationship-building is difficult. The lack of successful engagement leaves individuals in a cycle of homelessness and poor health, contributes to a crisis in patient flow, and causes moral injury to healthcare staff, exacerbating burn-out and worker shortages. Tieh funding will allow these organizations to hire care coordinators: licensed social workers who can engage with the focus population and connect them to a system of care. In duluth, the tieh project will allow the region's largest community mental health provider (human development center) and its largest shelter (CHUM) to establish a mobile medical team led by a registered nurse and community health worker. These staff would conduct outreach at the shelter and warming center, the library, free meal programs, the skywalks, an encampments. They will engage people while addressing their immediate concerns (e.g., wound-care, frostbite, shelter) and connect them to mental health and substance use services, housing assistance and benefit programs. Our project director and evaluator will work with partners on adherence to evidence-based practices including trauma-informed care, intensive case management, warm hand-offs, and harm reduction. Each of our partners works closely with their local homeless continuum of care and will be able to conduct coordinated entry assessments and make and monitor referrals to available housing program. MDH is also working with the minnesota housing finance agency and the minnesota department of human services on connections to the housing assistance programs including the state's housing stabilization services medicard benefit. We estimate that this project will serve approximately 4,000 individuals over the five-year grant period. We will measure our success based on 1) the percent of people experiencing homelessness with complex behavioral health needs in the catchment area who enroll in tieh or a comparable program 2) the percent of tieh participants who self-report an improvement in their mental health from baseline data collection to 6-month follow-up to discharge based on samhsa's client-level outcome data and 3) an increase in the number of tieh participants who report having a safe place to live from baseline data collection to 6-month follow-up to discharge based on samhsa's client-level outcome data.