consent. Once full DBT has been successfully completed, participants can elect to further their DBT skills in a Graduate DBT group -- meeting weekly for 1 hour – which allows participants to maintain their skills while also sharing support with their peers . Grad DBT refreshes DBT skills for clients who have graduated from the full program. Our newest DBT offerings expand the client population for whom DBT skills are effective. We offer a pre Radically-Open DBT (RO) designed to bring DBT skills to clients considered “over-controlled” and includes diagnoses like Anorexia Nervosa and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. This group is a precursor to a planned full RO DBT group which will run for 30 weeks, targeting mindfulness, interpersonal integrity, and social connectedness skills. The group teaches clients how to turn off “threat system” physiology to improve selfexpression through communication and facial and body signaling. Clients in DBT Prolonged Exposure (PE) attend a full 48-week group and additional individual sessions weekly to use exposure techniques targeting symptoms of PTSD. Individual PE sessions use in-vivo experience tasks, imaginal exposure, and processing to target traumatic memories and the associated symptoms that cause distress in daily life. These are used in conjunction with DBT skills to effectively treat PTSD. We are so proud of the robust DBT program that our talented clinicians have worked diligently to create. We look forward to having a positive impact on our clients and their recovery goals.
RIVERBEND COUNSELING ASSOCIATES LYNN ANNE PALMER, DIRECTOR In the face of the pandemic and social, economic, and political issues, our community experienced a rise in mental health challenges. Riverbend Counseling
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2022 ANNUAL REPORT
Associates (RCA) has continued to receive frequent calls for services, along with robust referrals from the community and from other organizations. This year our Admissions Team underwent an intense training in assessment and identification of client levels of risk. They became increasingly proficient in recognizing risk and, led by a Senior Clinician, the Triage Team has helped those most at risk to receive treatment in a timely manner. RCA has also increased its collaboration with other programs within Riverbend to get clients the appropriate levels of care as quickly as possible. RCA continues to respond to client and community requests for high-quality telehealth services. Many clients find that the convenience of telehealth is key to making their treatment possible. Utilizing telehealth has also allowed us to hire some of our workforce from outside of the immediate area. In so doing, we’ve been able to access a larger talent pool during this employment crisis. RCA has excellent part-time clinicians available now via Telehealth Services only. This is in addition to our larger community of full time staff who do a mix of telehealth and in-office work. RCA’s energies also continue to support educational opportunities that improve our therapists’ expertise and the services we can offer to clients. Several of our staff were trained this year in EMDR, as well as other related trauma interventions. Staff regularly attended workshops on Suicide Prevention and Postvention, Polyvagal Theory, and much more. RCA has supported the Pelvic Medicine Program at Concord Hospital for several years. We also continue to support UNH Law by providing two hours of drop-in time per week, during the school year. This is to support their students who can use help with coping skills. For those with greater mental health needs we have a clinician who provides onsite and telehealth counseling to UNH Law students.