Statement of Need and Recommendations

Recommendation 4:
Expand Peer and Family Services   

Peer and Family services are valuable additions to a person’s recovery. The North Star principle to the ASH Redesign is People First. This principle brought all work groups and members back to the core customers of the redesign– the people who need care throughout the mental health system and the people who provide the care. 

Each phase has increased peer and family members in the work groups, but work is still needed to increase engagement throughout the system. A detailed and thoughtful list of recommendations from the Peer and Family work group is found in Appendix 8 with a summary as follows. 

1. Peer and family leadership at the State level for State Hospital System - increase representation of peer and family leadership and direction at the state level recognizing their value within the system and clinical team. 

2. Expanding the Peer and Family Support Services continuum - Create an environmental scan of the continuum of care to establish the current availability of peer and family directed services. Based on the environmental scan it is recommended to then maintain lists and determine best areas for expansion 

3. Peer Bridges:

   • Establish a connection between ASH peer specialists to community peer specialists for a strong discharge bridge program as people return to the community. 

   • Support people in post-hospital life to reconnect with the community in a person-centered focus with peer support. 

4. Peer Workforce:

   • Support peer and family specialists through training, supervision and support to balance their own self and community care. 

   • Increase wages to a competitive living wage and provide opportunities for upward career trajectory. 

   • Allow for lived experience to substitute for professional or educational experience, when appropriate. 

   • Peer Respite (details found in Housing recommendations) - Plan and invest in a peer run crisis respite center to provide alternatives to hospitalization and jail on the ASH campus. 

5. Continued employing Peer and Family voice in implementing the new ASH by maintaining an on-going dialogue with people with lived experience and peer and family specialists with the opening of the new ASH. Continued feedback will support the person-first principle as the new hospital opens and add to ASH’s mission and vision. 

Peer voices engaged in the system are key to adjust the mental health system to support people in need of care. The opportunity to have people with lived experience and their families at the table offers first-hand knowledge of gaps, barriers, and new configurations to help lead to solutions for a more efficient and person-centered approach. Expanding engagement of peer and family specialists and services is key to continue to advance the person-centered model.