Connecting with People Who Care
A mental health system that embraces family, kin, whānau and community

Overview

For many people, family, kin, whānau and community are central to their life course and identity beyond mental ill-health. It is within these contexts that core relationships begin and within which most people live their lives, and from which they navigate all that life throws at them.

TheMHS Forum 2024 will explore the tensions, barriers, solutions, and remaining challenges in developing a mental health system that is inclusive of the full context in which a person lives their life. The role of family, kin, whānau and community in our mental health systems has fluctuated throughout many decades. This exploration will extend to the importance of communities of choice and the impact of friendship on recovery. We are now seeing the development of policy, practice and models of care that have a wider understanding of, and appreciation of these domains and that acknowledge them as central to recovery and good mental health.

How do mental health services proactively embrace families, kin, whānau and community in a compassionate and connected system of support? There is strong evidence that providing support in this context improves outcomes for people living with a mental health issue and promotes wider wellbeing. How do we acknowledge and equip this network of relationships to be part of a wider mental health system?

TheMHS Forum 2024 will focus on models of compassionate and inclusive care, exploring how the mental health system can work as an adjunct to the full context of a person’s life and promote inclusion, recovery, resilience, and better mental health.

Kenneth S. Thompson

Kenneth S. Thompson MD, Psychiatrist, was born in New York City. He grew up in Pittsburgh and was educated at Kenyon College and Boston University School of Medicine, where he was a National Health Service Corps Scholar. He was a resident in psychiatry at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, NY, and did a postdoctoral fellowship in mental health services research at Yale University. He has served as faculty at Yale University and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Graduate School of Public Health.

He has been the Director of the Institute for Public Health and Psychiatry at Pitt, the Chief Medical Officer of Harrisburg State Hospital, the Director for Medical Affairs at the Center for Mental Health Services in the US Department of Health and Human Services and the Medical Director of Recovery Innovations. He is the Chief Medical Officer of the Pennsylvania Psychiatric Leadership Council, a unique state-level education, policy and advocacy organization he helped found.

He is the co-founder and Executive Director of the Visible Hands Collaborative, which is working to bring Integrative Community Therapy from the favelas of Brazil to the English-speaking world. He practices in and oversees the mental health program at the Squirrel Hill Health Center, an FQHC. Dr. Thompson also provides psychiatric services at Milestone Community Mental Health Center, where he is the Medical Director,, the Duquesne University Psychology Clinic and the Center for Aviation Medicine.

He was the PI of a recent Robert Wood Johnson Grant linking Pittsburgh and Glasgow, Scotland to develop programs and policies in pursuit of achieving health equity and sustainability. He is a Soros/Institute of Medicine as a Profession Physician Advocate Fellow.

Throughout his career he has focused on social medicine and community psychiatry. He has written extensively and consults and lectures globally on issues pertaining to public service, leadership and advocacy, personal and community recovery and resiliency, whole person primary health services and mental health policy, public health and the struggle for health equity.

Lorez Meinhold

Lorez Meinhold is the founding Executive Director of Caring for Denver Foundation, funded by Denver and created by voters on November 16, 2018 to help address Denver’s mental health and substance misuse needs. The Caring for Denver Foundation has funded opportunities totaling over $142 million to over 243 organizations and agencies to improve the mental wellbeing of Denver’s youth, reduce their risk of substance misuse, create greater public visibility around those issues to reduce stigma, support initiatives to divert those struggling with mental health and substance misuse away from the justice system, and increase access to and use of resources for those struggling with mental health and substance misuse issues. Lorez has more than 20 years of health care policy and fundraising experience as a director of multi-lateral initiatives involving the public, private, and civic sectors, working at the local, state, and national levels. Lorez was the Senior Policy Director for both Governors Hickenlooper and Ritter, served as Deputy Director for the state’s Medicaid agency, and is the founder and former Executive Director of the Colorado Consumer Health Initiative.

Stuart O’Neill

Raised in Melbourne Australia, Stuart’s mostly self-employed life has provided its fair share of highs and lows. His life story in the book easily resonates. Stuart first became an Australian Surf Lifesaver in the 1980’s. It is a passion that he still fulfills to this day. His desire to save lives now includes this book. The Just One Reason suicide prevention toolkit is the product of his out of the box thinking and willingness to help others. Stuart takes pride in putting others first and bares his soul publicly about his personal battle with suicidal thoughts and depression. This book reveals Stuart’s own strategy for beating your inner demons and offers a powerful and very easy solution to a world problem that is getting worse, not better.

In September 2022 Stuart opened the doors of the first Mental Health Pub in Australia to demonstrate to Government that alternative models can work. At 180 days there were more than 1000 mental health conversations, new community groups established and multiple suicide preventions.

DAYS TO GO