Richard Hall Community Mental Health Center Uses Grant to Focus on Holistic Health & Wellness

Bridgewater, NJ – Freeholder Brian D. Levine has announced that the Richard Hall Community Mental Health Center (RHCMHC) has received a federal grant that will help to improve the holistic health and wellness of adults who have serious mental illnesses or co-occurring substance use disorders.

The nationally competitive grant – up to $1.6 million provided over a four-year period – was awarded to Somerset County by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). RHCMHC will use the grant money to develop partnerships with a federally-qualified healthcare facility and at least two community healthcare providers to deliver onsite primary healthcare services.

“We are extremely pleased to be selected for this grant,” said Freeholder Brian D. Levine, human services liaison. “Integrating primary care medical services in a mental health setting will enable Richard Hall to treat the whole person, rather than just one aspect of that individual’s health issues.”

The integrated healthcare service at RHCMHC will concentrate on veterans, individuals with histories of unaddressed trauma, people who are struggling with addictions, the elderly, the homeless and the aging-out youth population (18-21).

The mental health center will coordinate care by integrating treatment teams, evidence-based and promising wellness interventions, program structures, performance monitoring and continuous quality improvement. Research has documented that exposure to traumatic events, impaired neurodevelopmental and immune systems responses correlate to subsequent health risk behaviors, resulting in chronic physical or mental health disorders.

Unaddressed trauma significantly increases the risk of mental and substance use disorders and chronic physical illnesses. Many health conditions are preventable through routine health promotion activities, primary care screening, monitoring, treatment and care management /coordination strategies and other outreach programs.

SAMHSA certifies that mental health is essential to overall health and wellness, that prevention works, that treatment is effective and people do recover from mental and substance use disorders.

Mental health services improve the overall health status of individuals and reduce health care and other costs to society. Continued improvement in the delivery and financing of prevention, treatment and recovery will provide a cost savings/benefit to Somerset County.

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-- Somerset County Board of Chosen Freeholders