Project Grant H79SM091126

SAMHSA's Center for Mental Health Services awarded $650,000 to the Health Services Kentucky Cabinet For on September 30, 2026, under the Comprehensive Community Mental Health Services for Children with Serious Emotional Disturbances program (CFDA 93.104) to establish the Clinical High Risk for Psychosis STRONG (Supporting Treatment, Resiliency, Outreach, Networking, and Growth) Initiative.

The project will implement screening, assessment, stepped-care intervention, shared decision-making, family engagement, crisis planning, and statewide capacity-building activities to identify and support youth and young adults ages 12–25 at clinical high risk for psychosis before first episode onset. The work builds on Kentucky's existing Coordinated Specialty Care/iHope infrastructure. STRONG will directly serve 92 youth and young adults over the project period, with thousands more served indirectly through outreach, awareness, and education initiatives targeting individuals with attenuated psychotic symptoms, functional decline, or related behavioral health concerns. Participants are drawn from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds, including those experiencing poverty, housing instability, and transportation barriers with limited access to specialty behavioral health care.

The project operates across seven counties in the Seven Counties Services region: Jefferson, Bullitt, Henry, Oldham, Shelby, Spencer, and Trimble, which comprise geographically diverse urban, suburban, and rural communities with a combined population of 1,045,944 and 232,123 youth under age 18. Place of performance is Frankfort, Kentucky. The award runs through September 29, 2030, with performance led by the Department of Behavioral Health, Developmental and Intellectual Disabilities in partnership with Seven Counties Services.