title: Development, implementation, and preliminary evaluation of a recovery-based curriculum for community navigation specialists working with individuals with serious mental illnesses and repeated hospitalizations.
abstract: A recovery-oriented curriculum for training the Community Navigation Specialists (CNSs) of the new Opening Doors to Recovery in Southeast Georgia program was developed, implemented, and preliminarily evaluated. This new mental health program provides mobile, community-based support services to individuals with serious mental illnesses and a history of psychiatric inpatient recidivism (and commonly past incarcerations and homelessness). Teams of CNSs include a licensed social worker, a family member of an individual with a serious mental illness, and a peer specialist with lived experience. In two courses held in February and June of 2011, 14 newly hired CNSs participated in the new training. A pre-training/post-training evaluation demonstrated statistically significant improvements in pertinent knowledge and self-efficacy for working in a community navigation role. As the recovery paradigm continues to be implemented in diverse real-world mental health treatment settings, recovery-based training curricula should be carefully constructed and evaluated.
authors.affiliation: The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, 2120 L Street, N.W., Suite 600, Washington, DC, 20037, USA, mcompton@mfa.gwu.edu.
authors.forename: Michael T
authors.initials: MT
authors.lastname: Compton
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Reed
authors.forename: Beth
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Broussard
authors.forename: Ike
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Powell
authors.forename: Glyn V
authors.initials: GV
authors.lastname: Thomas
authors.forename: Alicia
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Moore
authors.forename: Kelly
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Cito
authors.forename: Nora
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Haynes
mesh_terms: D003156:Community Mental Health Services / Q000379:methods* / Q000458:organization & administration; D003479:Curriculum; D004517:Education, Professional / Q000379:methods*; D005845:Georgia; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000628:therapy*; D062526:Patient Navigation / Q000379:methods* / Q000458:organization & administration; D016730:Program Development; D015397:Program Evaluation; D012008:Recurrence; D012074:Remission Induction / Q000379:methods