Mental Health Programming

Mental health programming includes screening, assessment and treatment of youth placed in DJJ facilities. Within two hours of admission to a DJJ facility, each youth is screened for mental health issues, traumatic experiences, substance use, and suicide/self-harm risk. Approximately 50% of youth are then referred for a more thorough mental health assessment by a qualified mental health professional. The goal is to identify any at-risk youth as early as possible and then to provide care to meet their basic mental health needs. This goal is accomplished through services provided to youth by a treatment team that includes master’s level mental health clinicians, psychologists, and psychiatrists.

Evidence-based mental health interventions that are delivered by Mental Health staff in DJJ secure facilities include:

  • DBT (Dialectical Behavior Therapy)- Dialectical behavior therapy is an evidence-based psychotherapy designed to treat personality disorders and interpersonal conflicts. There is evidence that DBT can be useful in treating mood disorders, suicidal ideation, and for change in behavioral patterns such as self-harm and substance use. This empirically validated approach demonstrates how to effectively treat (reduce/eliminate) suicidal behavior and non-suicidal self-injury, the treatment for emotion-dysregulation and youth benefit from building more effective coping strategies to better manage stress.

     

  • Trauma Affect Regulation: Guide for Education & Treatment (TARGET): This is a group and individual treatment model for youth who have experienced multiple traumatic events. TARGET focuses on helping youth develop affect/emotional regulation skills, develop healthy self-soothing and self-control techniques, and address their physiological and psychological responses to trauma.

 

  • Collaborative Assessment and Management of Suicidality (CAMS): This approach to suicidality integrates a range of theoretical orientations (including psychodynamic, cognitive, behavioral, humanistic, existential, and interpersonal notions) into a structured clinical format emphasizing the importance of the counselor and client working together to elucidate and understand the "functional" role of suicidal thoughts and behaviors in the patient's life.