Helping Children One Family at a Time

Positive and healthy mental health is critical to everyone especially to children and youth and it includes overall well-being such as their emotional, physical and behavioral health. It can affect how they think, feel, and act and it can affect how they handle stress and make healthy decisions.

The Detroit Wayne Integrated Health Network (DWIHN) serves 75,000 individuals in Detroit and Wayne County who are struggling with mental illness, substance use and disability related concerns. DWIHN also has a robust Children’s Initiatives Department serving children and families and providing them with the help they need at home, at school and in the community.

"There's a wide spectrum when addressing mental health problems in young people,” said DWIHN Director of Children’s Initiatives Cassandra Phipps. “For example, some youth might pres- ent with something called “adjustment disorder” where they are having a hard time adjusting, and we have to figure out if it is something on that level or more serious like a mood disorder."

DWIHN manages several different grant opportunities and programs. One very successful program is called “Parenting Management Training Oregon Model” (PMTO), where parents can learn the skills they need to provide adequate care for their kids. This program is designed for children from preschool to adolescents and it helps parents promote positive change in their families.

DWIHN also offers early childhood infant mental health services for mothers struggling with pregnancy or addiction and may be experiencing a highrisk pregnancy. In addition, services are offered to youth involved in the investigation or abuse of parents or children who are considered mentally ill.

“There are many different aspects of the young person’s life that DWIHN can assist with whether it is a mental illness or disability-related concern,” said Phipps. “We have providers, clinicians, therapists, school-based programs that can help children and parents flourish and learn how to cope with what is happening in their lives.”

For parents, grandparents and guardians who may be raising teens and young adults, DWIHN offers many resources and programs through its Youth United program. These young people are advocates and ambassadors for mental health and they are out in the community every day spreading the word about stigma and mental health.

DWIHN also has providers including Black Family Development that offers Leadership and Training by preparing young adults to transition out of the home. https://www.blackfamilydevelopment.org/ that the disease then you wouldn’t recommend it.”

Dr. Fauci believes that life comes with a slight bit of risk, but says the vaccines are overwhelmingly safe and the benefits outweigh the small risk.

“The vaccines which have saved millions of lives thus far is a very safe vaccine,” he notes.

As COVID enters a third year in the United States, Fauci says he has no regrets in his forthcoming messages to the American people.

“I’m comfortable with the decisions based on the data I had at the time,” he said. “Information is available to you and you can only act on the information you have and you have to be flexible enough to change things like recommendations and guidelines depending upon the accommodation of new data and new evidence.”

Dr. Fauci retired from NIAID and his White House senior advisory role to President Biden at the end of 2022.

To learn more about DWIHN services and supports for children and adults, please visit, www.dwihn.org. If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts, mental health or substance use issues, please call our 24/7 Access Center Helpline at 800-241-4949.

If you’d like to look for a provider in your neighborhood, click here: https:// www.dwihn.org/find-a-provider

By Sherri Kolade

One does not have to look far to see the distressing reality: mental health issues are on the rise. That proof is out there -- from increased youth emergency room visits for mental health-related crises to a constant stream of news articles where unwell victims are dying either at their own hands or someone else’s. What help is there for people who seemingly fall through the cracks?

Where was the help for someone like Pontiac mother Monica Cannady and her two boys Malik Milton, 3, and Kyle Milton, 9, who were found frozen to death in an overgrown field in Pontiac, deaths where mental health problems were said to be a factor.

“I wanted to really examine what happened in totality,” said Sheriff Michael Bouchard in the article.

“How do we not just as a police agency, but societally, how do we prevent stuff like this in the future?” Bouchard said in a published report. “How do we prevent people from falling through the cracks.”

“I would love to have the federal government and state government pay to have someone embedded on our staff,” Bouchard said. “A social worker, mental health worker so that when they come across someone in any situation, if it’s not an acute crisis like it