Community initiatives and trainings for better mental health care
At Penn Medicine, our mental health support goes beyond the hospital walls. We meet people where they are, in communities across the greater Philadelphia, Lancaster, and Princeton regions, to ensure timely access to care. Through these initiatives, we ensure individuals and communities gain the tools and resources they need to address mental health challenges in their daily lives.
The Penn Collaborative for CBT and Implementation Science is an innovative initiative dedicated to making quality mental health care accessible to everyone, regardless of socioeconomic status. The Collaborative partners with the Philadelphia Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services (DBHIDS) and Community Behavioral Health (CBH) to provide mental health support and resources to residents of Philadelphia, the poorest of the largest cities in the U.S. This partnership empowers community mental health agencies to deliver evidence-based treatments, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), to underserved populations.
The Collaborative has made a significant impact by training therapists in all Philadelphia schools and working with researchers worldwide to share best practices in mental health care. By providing front-line clinicians with advanced tools and strategies, the Penn Collaborative effectively connects high-quality mental health services with communities that need them the most.
Let’s Talk, Lancaster is a coalition of organizations, including Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health, that work together to improve mental well-being in Lancaster County. Our coalition members include medical and behavioral health providers, community and social service organizations, school professionals, and community members. We envision a Lancaster community that promotes and supports an environment where all people live healthy lives.
Our coalition efforts include standardized screening for anxiety and depression across primary care practices, increasing the number of behavioral health providers, and providing community mental-health training. By connecting mental and physical health, we help reduce the stigma around mental illness, promote resiliency, and improve the link between primary and mental health care.
The goal for this program is for Lancaster County to become a trauma-informed community that addresses and reduces traumatic childhood experiences.
Trauma results from an event or set of circumstances that is experienced by an individual as physically or emotionally harmful and that has lasting adverse effects.
This initiative, supported by Let’s Talk, Lancaster and the Lancaster General Health Behavioral Health Impact Fund, includes online training modules and specialized trainings for the community and organizations to advance trauma-informed policies and practices. It provides an overview and awareness of trauma, resilience, and trauma-informed care for anyone who interacts with local individuals and families who may have experienced trauma, including human services professionals, educators, the faith community, employers, government agencies, and others.
Penn Medicine Lancaster General and Penn Medicine Princeton Health offer mental health first aid training to help people learn how to recognize and respond to mental health challenges. The program teaches important skills to support others, connect them to help, and reduce the stigma around mental health.
At Penn Medicine Princeton Health, mental health first aid training is available for community members and professionals such as EMTs and educators. This eight-hour course, led by expert instructors, including Princeton House Behavioral Health counselors, is offered at Princeton Health Community Wellness locations and by request at schools, workplaces, and other community venues. Participants learn to recognize symptoms, provide initial support, and connect people with professional help, addressing issues like depression, anxiety, trauma, and substance use.
Penn Medicine Lancaster General offers mental health first aid training with support from a federal grant. The program is provided to community members and tenth-grade students in local schools. By 2027, the program aims to train over 4,000 people in the area. These trainees will help identify mental health issues early and connect people to appropriate care.
Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health offers a free, online, self-paced training course titled “Understanding Trauma, Resilience and Trauma Informed Care.”
This course provides a foundational understanding of trauma, Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), resilience, vicarious trauma, and trauma-informed care for anyone in the community who interacts with individuals and families who may have experienced trauma, including law enforcement and criminal justice professionals, first responders, healthcare and behavioral health providers, human services professionals, educators, employers, government agencies, faith community leaders, and others.
The course is broken into four modules that are each one hour in length, with interactive activities in each module and a knowledge quiz at the end of each module. No advance registration is required, and anyone can access these training courses at any time from wherever they may be located.